


if you carry the torch (i'll follow the light)

by sayingwhatiam



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Angst with a Happy Ending, Captain Swan January Joy 2021 (Once Upon a Time), Cheating, Childhood Friends, F/M, Implied/Referenced Sex, Love Triangles, Pregnancy Scares, Recreational Drug Use, School Dances, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, Underage Drinking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-19
Updated: 2021-01-19
Packaged: 2021-03-18 07:15:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 35,426
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28863156
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sayingwhatiam/pseuds/sayingwhatiam
Summary: Killian was her first real best friend, close practically since the day he and his brother moved in next door to her, traveling across the ocean from England to Maine to live with their father after their mother passed away. She was ten, and fascinated by his accent, having only ever heard something like it in movies. “You sound like Harry Potter,” she told him, standing on her tiptoes to see over the fence into his yard.“Not that four-eyed git, come on!” He was so mad, and Emma had just laughed and laughed until he finally couldn’t stay mad anymore. He smiled at her then, introducing himself and his older brother, and they’d been inseparable ever since.ORActually, to clarify, Emma and Killian aren't dating, but they are endgame.
Relationships: Captain Hook | Killian Jones/Emma Swan, Minor or Background Relationship(s)
Comments: 5
Kudos: 41





	if you carry the torch (i'll follow the light)

**Author's Note:**

> This fic started as a joke months ago, me just tweeting "captain swan riverdale au. neal is jughead" and somehow, that spiraled into this 35k monster that has basically nothing to do with Riverdale. There are a few references that you'll get if you watch the show, but I promise, there's nothing Riverdale-esque about this. It pretends to be angsty and full of CW-level drama, but really, it's just Captain Swan fluff. 
> 
> Lots of terrible teenagers making bad decisions, including lots of cheating, although I did try to be as nice to Neal as possible. 
> 
> Endlessly thankful to CSJJ for inspiring me to finish and post the longest thing I've ever written.
> 
> Title from Carry the Torch, which I guess is by Archie Andrews.

* * *

“It’s all about the tumblers,” Neal says softly, bent down to focus on the lock in front of him.

Emma rolls her eyes. “You always say that, but you’ve got like a 20% success rate.”

“Probably because you’re always distracting me.” He’s silent for a moment, and then punches his fist in the air, swinging the gate open. “After you.”

Emma does a half-curtsy, making Neal grin, and steps past him into the old cemetery. “So what are we doing here? Are you done being weird and cagey?”

“Cagey? Me? Never!” He wraps his arm around her shoulder to guide her through the headstones in the darkness, and Emma lets him lead for once. “We’re throwing a dual going-away party.”

“In a creepy old graveyard at midnight? Couldn’t we have just done this at Granny’s? I could kill for a hot chocolate right now.”

“I thought rum might fit the occasion better.” Emma turns towards the voice to see Killian leaning against a gravestone, holding a half-empty bottle of captain Morgan in his outstretched hand. She takes a step towards him, Neal’s arm falling off her shoulder, and Killian smirks. “Knew you’d appreciate my hard work in acquiring this bottle for us, love.”

Emma rolls her eyes and grabs the bottle out of his hand, taking a long drink. “Such hard work stealing this from your dad’s liquor cabinet.”

“Where’s everybody else?” Neal asks, stepping forward to take the bottle himself.

“More people are coming? Do we like anyone else?” Emma looks between the boys, her best friend and her boyfriend, confused.

Emma isn’t really good at making friends, is the thing. She has August, from the group home when they were kids, but he’s a few years older than her and already off at college, probably way too busy working on his next novel to come home just for Neal’s graduation. She has Ruby, who she met shortly after being adopted and moving to Storybrooke when she was seven, but they hadn’t been as close since starting high school three years ago.

Killian was her first real best friend, close practically since the day he and his brother moved in next door to her, traveling across the ocean from England to Maine to live with their father after their mother passed away. She was ten, and fascinated by his accent, having only ever heard something like it in movies. “You sound like Harry Potter,” she told him, standing on her tiptoes to see over the fence into his yard.

“Not that four-eyes git, come on!” He was so mad, and Emma had just laughed and laughed until he finally couldn’t stay mad anymore. He smiled at her then, introducing himself and his older brother, and they’d been inseparable ever since.

Neal was Killian’s friend first, from work down at the docks, a year older than them, and any friend of Killian’s is a friend of Emma’s. He kissed her for the first time over Christmas break, after they had spent weeks trying to figure out what Neal’s father was hiding from him and somehow gotten locked in a closet in Mr Gold’s pawn shop. It was a shock - Emma had honestly never really thought of Neal that way, mostly distracted by other confusing seventeen-year-old feelings - but it wasn’t bad. And suddenly she had a boyfriend.

“Just Peter and Robin,” Neal says with a shrug. “The crew.”

“No, that’s _your_ crew. This,” Emma gestures at the three of them, “is my crew.”

“What about me?” Emma spins around, grin breaking out on her face without permission, and flings herself into August’s open arms. He squeezes her back, tight and warm as always. Before she was adopted by the Swans, this was all she had, and his big brother hugs always feel most like home.

“What are you doing here? You barely even like Neal!”

Neal makes a scoffing sound behind her, and she can see Killian’s cocky smirk out of the corner of her eye, but August just laughs softly, in that wry way of his. “I like Neal just fine. I don’t like him dating you.” Emma looks over her shoulder to shrug at Neal, who shrugs back. August is just over-protective. “I’m actually here for my dad’s retirement party next week; he’s gonna be focusing on his toy shop full time now instead of working for anyone else.”

“And you decided to stop by this rowdy graveyard party? I’m honored.”

August looks around at the absolutely-not-rowdy crowd and his lip twitches into a small smile. “Wouldn’t want to keep you from the rowdiness.” He reaches into his satchel and pulls out a bottle of tequila. “Thought you might want some legally-acquired booze from your newly-twenty-one best friend.”

“I’m her best friend, mate, and she’s already got rum,” Killian says, startling her. He is standing next to her, looking at August like this is a challenge, providing Emma with her favorite alcohol, and her eyes widen.

August just laughs, the way he always does, never taking anything seriously, least of all Killian Jones. “I’m sure Emma will happily drink whatever alcohol is in her hand.”

“Hey.” Emma reaches out and punches August’s arm. “You make me sound like a drunk.”

“You’re just a lass who knows how to have fun,” Killian says, throwing his arm over her shoulder and handing her the rum. She smiles up at him and takes a drink.

“You’re here!” Neal yells, pulling Emma’s attention away from Killian.

“Hope we didn’t miss the party,” Robin says from behind her, he and Peter coming in through the already-opened gate. And great, Regina is with them. Always Emma’s favorite person to see outside of school, as if she wants to be in that evil girl’s presence for one minute more than required.

“Doesn’t seem to have started yet,” Regina drawls, and pulls a bottle of red wine out of her giant purse. Of course.

“Guys, guys.” Neal holds his hands up, standing in the middle of them all. “Can we all pretend to like each other for an hour? Peter and I are graduating this weekend and I’m heading to school a week later for that summer program, and Killian is going back to England to see his brother or whatever. This is the last time we can all be together for a long time, let’s be chill.”

Emma is pretty sure she blacks out at the end there, which considering she had only had two sips of rum, is pretty disorienting. There’s no way she heard him say Killian is spending the summer in a whole different country. Absolutely not. He would have told her.

“Swan,” Killian whispers. His arm is still around her shoulders and she turns in it, body pressing against his. “I was going to tell you, Swan, I swear.”

“When?” She hisses under her breath. “A text when your plane lands in fucking London?”

“You know I’m not from London-“ Emma groans and shrugs out from under his arm, turning her back to him. Everyone else is distracted by the fancy bottle of tequila August has, asking him questions about college and liquor stores while he pours everyone little shots in paper cups he also apparently has in his bag, so they don’t notice that Emma is seconds away from a full on meltdown.

Killian gently tugs on her arm, forcing her to face him. “I was going to tell you. The timing is just never right and you’re always so busy with Neal.”

She rolls her eyes. “Don’t blame my boyfriend for the fact that you’re a coward who couldn’t handle the fact that I might be a little bit sad about missing my best friend. Grow up, Jones.”

“You’re right. I screwed this one up, Emma.” Emma meets his eyes, and yeah, he looks sorry. His bright blue eyes are sad, his bottom lip doing that little pouty thing it always does when he knew he needs to beg for forgiveness, and she knows she can't stay mad at that.

“Fine,” she sighs and Killian smiles. “I forgive you, but only because of the rum. And you’re gonna bring me back all the British candy like you did that one Christmas.”

“That’s a promise, love.”

They turn back to the group then, spirits lighter, Emma smiling and fitting herself back in against Neal’s side. They pass the bottles around, Regina even sharing her wine, listening to August’s stories about college and talking about how their lives will all change, what senior year might be like for some of them, what college could be for others. Emma forces herself to be happy, to focus on this moment, not on the next couple of weeks when she will lose two of the most important people to her. Tonight, body warm and fuzzy from the rum, Neal’s hand on her knee when they all sat on the grass, Killian’s crooked smile, the moonlight over all of them, is all that matters.

\---

“I can’t believe you forced me to let you drive me to the airport,” Killian says, propping his feet up on the dash. “In this death machine.”

“Be nice to her, she’s my baby.” Emma reaches over and smacks his ankles, gesturing for him to get them off her brand new used VW bug. “I’ve been saving my tips from Granny’s since the day I started there for this.”

Killian quirks an eyebrow. “And you chose this, eh? I guess if we die on the way, we won’t have the awkward goodbyes.”

Emma swallows down the lump of sadness in her throat and forces out a laugh. “You’re such an ass. It’s a perfectly good car. Not all of us can own a boat.”

“I don’t own a boat, my father owns a boat," he clarifies.

“And you can’t drive it to the airport, so I win.” She sticks her tongue out at him and he grins. “Now shut up, this is supposed to be our sweet goodbye time and you’re just making me happy you’re leaving.”

“Maybe that’s the point, making it easier on you and all that.” He is smiling, but when Emma turns to look at him quickly, she can see that he looks sad, too. Good.

They have been practically inseparable for eight years, other than his occasional week-long trips home to visit his grandparents or her one family vacation to Cape Cod. Now he is about to be gone for three months, the whole summer, leaving her with basically no one until the first day of senior year. It’s mean, is what it is.

They’re silent for a long while, listening to the radio because obviously her car doesn’t have an AUX plug, and then Emma sighs. “I think I really had crazy dreams about what this summer is going to be like, and now I’m just trying to remember what time zone you’ll be in so we can schedule FaceTime calls. This sucks.”

He reaches over, taking her hand from where it is on the steering wheel and giving it a squeeze. “I’ll be back before you know it, and senior year will be just like we planned. I swear it.”

“It better be,” she says, taking her hand back to turn on her blinker and pull into the airport.

Emma holds back the tears as she helps Killian with his bags, even when he hugs her goodbye, muttering a soft “love you” into her hair, even when he stops just inside the sliding doors to the terminal to wave one last time. But back in the car, the only radio station that came in turned all the way up, she lets herself cry.

It is going to be a long summer.

——

Neal leaves three days later, driving down to his shiny new dorm at NYU in his beat up station wagon for whatever a “summer session” is. Something for smart kids, or maybe just something for kids who wants to get away from the dad they just found out had been lying to them about what happened to their mother for their entire life.

He kisses her goodbye outside his house, holding her for as long as possible, and Emma lets herself cry a little bit this time. Just a tear or two, the required girlfriend goodbye tears. He presses one last kiss to the corner of her eye, whispers that he loves her, and then she blinks and he is gone.

Just like that, she’s alone.

A week later, her period is late.

Two days after that, when it is still late, she is parked outside of the pharmacy, shaking. She can’t go in there. In a small town like this, her parents would find out she is buying a pregnancy test within the hour. As great as the Swans are, after seven years of seeing the horrors of foster care, it isn’t really possible for her to trust any adults completely. What if they kick her out?

She’s shaken out of her dark thoughts by a knock at her passenger window. It’s Regina, mouthing her name. The literal last person she wants to talk to right now, but maybe it can help her take her mind off how quickly her life has fallen apart.

She unlocks the door and, surprisingly, Regina opens it and slide in. “This car is disgusting,” are the first words out of her mouth.

“Thanks, I’m glad you hate it.” Emma rolls her eyes. “What do you want?”

“I’m just trying to figure out why you’re lurking outside the pharmacy and if I need to call the sheriff. Robin told me you and Neal have shoplifted before.”

Emma laughs. “I really don’t think Robin can judge anyone for shoplifting.” Regina is silent, unable to defend her boyfriend against the completely true accusations. “I’m just working up the nerve to go in there.”

Without missing a beat, Regina looks at her and states, “you need a pregnancy test?” Emma turns to her, wide-eyed in shock. “I know the look on your face. I’m sure I had the same one last year when I thought Daniel and I had the same problem.”

“How did I miss those rumors?”

Regina smirks. “One of the perks of being the mayor’s daughter is that little shopkeepers are scared to gossip about you.” She pauses, tilting her head to get a better look at Emma. “I can buy you one, if you want.”

“What’s in it for you?” Emma asks, skeptical.

“Sometimes I’m a nice person, Swan.” And without another word, she gets out of the car.

Emma groans, letting her head hit the steering wheel and making the car sputter out a weak honk. Well now she really has to go do this herself. Pregnancy test. Small town rumor mill, activate.

As she gathers up her things, looking for sunglasses as if that will hide her identity, the passenger door opens again. “Thank me later,” Regina says, tossing a paper bag at her. “I hope it’s negative. You’d be a terrible mother.”

Emma doesn’t know whether to say “thank you” or “fuck you”, but Regina closes the door before she could say either.

——

Emma’s phone lights up with a FaceTime request from Killian while she is pacing around her tiny bathroom. She hesitates, wanting so badly to ignore it, but it is his first call since he left, and she can’t miss it.

“Hello, love, you look as beautiful as ever in your pixelated form,” he says as he pops up on her screen, grinning. Emma laughs and rolls her eyes simultaneously. “How are things across the pond?”

“The same,” Emma says shortly. “How’s Liam? Are you enjoying the bangers and mash?”

“Liam is good, food is as comfortingly bad as always, you’re hiding something,” he replies. Fuck.

“And that is why I have like two friends. Why do you have to be able to tell when I’m lying? Isn’t that supposed to be my superpower?”

“I have the superpower of being your dearest friend in all the world. Now tell me -“ they’re interrupted by the timer on her phone going off, letting her know the test is done. “What is that?”

Emma ignores him, picking up the pregnancy test from where she had hidden it so she wouldn’t watch it the whole time she was waiting.

“Emma?” Killian says, trying to force her attention back to him.

She smiles at the screen, and holds up the test. “I’m not pregnant!”

“That was a possibility?” Killian looks like he had seen a ghost, or maybe like he is about to puke. Or both.

Emma shrugs. “Maybe? I was late, it is complicated. Google says it could be stress, but I wanted to be sure.”

“I’ll kill him,” he says simply, the anger in his eyes apparent even on FaceTime.

“You are not going to murder Neal because I’m dumb and paranoid, Jones,” she says firmly. “You are friends and he didn’t do anything wrong.”

“Almost abandoned you with a little babe, he did!”

Emma laughs. “But he didn’t, I’m fine, everything is fine. We have many more uninterrupted years of rum drinking ahead of us.”

Killian smiles softly then, nodding. “I didn’t even know you two were....” he trails off, and Emma bites her lip, feeling suddenly strangely guilty. “You’re that serious?”

“I don’t know,” Emma admits. “Sometimes yes, and then sometimes he’ll say he loves me and I can’t say it back because it doesn’t feel true. I think that’s just what dating is like now though.”

“I think if you love someone you always know it, no matter how old you are.” Killian’s voice is soft, serious, and Emma swallows a lump in her throat. “I’m glad you’re not having a baby, though, I’m not ready to be Uncle Killian quite yet.”

“I’m not ready to be mommy Emma, so we’re both happy.” She pauses, smiling at him. “I miss you.”

“And I you. This summer will go by so quickly, I’m sure.”

“I doubt it, but your optimism is nice.”

They talks for another hour, Emma sitting on the bathroom floor, listening intently to Killian’s ridiculous stories. She misses him so much.

——-

“As much as I love hanging out with you, you know I’m leaving soon and you’re going to have to get a life again, right?”

August is sitting at his desk, back to Emma, hands held over his keyboard. Emma looks over at him from across the room, holding her place in the book she’s reading with her finger. “You don’t need to remind me. This is the summer of all my friends leaving me.”

August sighs. “This drama queen act is so not like you.”

“You haven’t seen me since Christmas, maybe I’m a brand new person!” August turns in his chair to laugh at her for that, but in that affectionate way he has about him always. Emma might’ve technically been an only child, but with August, she never felt alone. “Okay, fine, I’m the same. I’m just tired of growing up. Everyone is going to leave eventually.” She throws her hands up in the air, accidentally sending the book she was holding sailing across the room. “Hell, even I’m leaving for college next year and what if I never come back?”

“If I couldn’t stay away from this nothing town, what makes you think you could?” August smirks at her, and Emma groans. “Come on, things aren’t that bad here. You have a family and a job and friends -“

“No, all my friends left me!” She covers her face with one of the pillows on the bed and flops backwards. They’re both silent for a minute, August letting her wallow the way he always does, and then she lifts the pillow to look over at him.

“You good now? Ready to talk about what’s actually wrong?”

“I think....” she trails off, squeezing her eyes shut for a moment, and then tries again. “I think I really believed things would never change. That I wouldn’t grow up and people wouldn’t leave and my boyfriend wouldn’t move six hours away and my best friend wouldn’t spend the summer in England and....it’s just all gonna be over so soon.”

“What? High school?” August sighs. “I promise, high school isn’t the peak of your life.”

“No, like. Childhood. Innocence. Lost boys never growing up type shit.”

They’re both silent again, Emma letting herself relax into the bed, trying to recapture the warm safety of when she was a tiny little girl in the group home and would make August share his bed after she had a nightmare. She doesn’t know why she’s so scared, why this summer feels so huge and life-altering. Maybe it was the pregnancy scare, maybe it was Killian reminding her that he is probably going back to England for university, maybe it was that time she and Neal figured out their principal was in an organ-harvesting cult when she truly believed nothing bad could ever happen in Storybrooke. Maybe it was being almost-eighteen and about to start her senior year and adulthood in one.

“Wanna just get high and watch Adventure Time?” August says, finally, and Emma laughs. “No more using our brains for the rest of the day, okay?”

“You’ve got a deal.” And for a few hours, she lets herself stop worrying.

——

It’s a hazy day in July when Emma sees Regina next. The doorbell rings while she is lying on the couch, feet almost pressing up against the air conditioning unit, popsicle melting down her wrist.

Emma would’ve lost any bet about who she would find on her front porch. “Regina?”

“Good afternoon, Miss Swan,” Emma rolls her eyes at the stupid formality of what is essentially a nickname, but Regina continues. “Robin is playing soccer or something and if I have to spend another second trapped in the house with Zelena, I’m going to strangle her.”

“So you’d rather spend time with me? Won’t you strangle me too?”

Regina shrugs. “I might, but you’d deserve it.”

Emma laughs a little despite herself and Regina’s eyes sparkle like she is holding a laugh in herself. “You can come in, but we don’t have central air and I ate all the orange popsicles.”

“But you’re an only child with two working parents. Seems like a fair trade to me.” Regina steps in the house, kicking off her expensive sandals and heads in the direction of the humming AC unit. “I’m guessing you’re not having Neal’s love child?” She says, flopping down into the armchair.

“Nope,” Emma says, returning to her spot on the couch. “Mostly just trying to forget that even happened.”

Regina quirks an eyebrow. “So you haven’t even told him?”

“Are you asking for gossip or as a friend?”

Regina puts a hand to her heart, faking shock. “A friend? I didn’t know we were there.”

Emma rolls her eyes. “Whatever, Regina. I haven’t told Neal because he’s off having fun and I don’t want to ruin that for him. I made Killian promise not to say anything, so you better not either.”

Regina leans forward, elbows on her knees, chin resting in her hand. “You’ve told Killian though?”

“Obviously. He’s my best friend.”

Regina laughs a little, and the sound makes Emma wince. It isn’t a friendly laugh. “Yes, of course he is. I’m sure he was thrilled to find out you and Neal aren’t going to be tied together forever.”

“What does that mean?” Emma furrows her brow. “Killian doesn’t care about my relationship status. I’m sure he loves that his two best friends are together.”

Regina smiles and shrugs. “Maybe. He just seems a little jealous to me.” She sits back in her seat. “So many people want to be Emma Swan’s best friend.”

“Not you, though. You probably just want my popsicles.” So yes, Emma is changing the subject, but the conversation is making her feel squirmy and bad, like maybe she is going to vomit. Killian would never be jealous.

Regina just looks at her for a moment and then nods. “I’m here for the popsicles and silence.”

——-

Neal sends her letters - actual, handwritten letters, through the mail. He has pretty terrible handwriting, and Emma can’t always read every word, but it’s the absolute sweetest thing.

He includes Polaroid sometimes, menus of his favorite take out spots, movie ticket stubs.

“ _I wish you were here,_ ” he writes. “ _This would be even better if I could share it with you. I hope you come here next year._ ”

Emma hates to even think about applying to college and picking a school and all of that mess, but when Neal writes these letters, she can’t help but imagine them having a nice little life together in New York. Coffee shops and walks in the park and lectures at prestigious universities. It sounds nice.

It sounds nicer than they deserve maybe.

Not that they don’t deserve good things, but well. Emma knows she’s kind of a heartless bitch sometimes, and this is her _now,_ after a decade with a loving family. She was even worse when she was a kid. And Neal once spent six months in juvie for fighting and has spent the last eight months trying to slowly ruin his dad’s life because of one (pretty major) lie.

If Emma was to make a bet on the way her life is going to turn out, it would be “okay.” Maybe a husband, maybe a kid, maybe a job she didn’t hate. No great love whisking her away to life-changing adventures, no dreams come true, no happy endings.

But sometimes, when she lets herself believe, she hopes that Neal can change her mind.

—-

Emma isn’t one for countdowns, but somehow, one morning she wakes up and her first thought is “Killian comes hone in two days.”

She isn’t even sure she consciously knew the date he was coming home; he had mentioned it a few times over the phone or through texts or something, but that was it. Hell, other than the fact that senior year starts on Monday, she isn’t even sure she knows what the date is.

But there it is. Killian. Two days. She can’t stop thinking it and grinning to herself as she heads downstairs for coffee. She really misses her best friend.

She checks her phone while she waits for the coffee to brew, the mindless half-asleep scroll. There’s a text from Regina reminding her that student counsel elections are in three weeks and she promised she would help her hang posters around the school, which Emma is pretty sure Regina has reminded her of literally every day. There’s a text from her mom asking her to please put the frozen lasagna she made in the oven at exactly 4:45.

There’s an Instagram push notification that Killian posted something, which is weird considering he probably uses Instagram about five times a year. Emma clicks it.

“ _gonna miss this one most of all_ ”

It’s a photo of him with his arm around an absolutely gorgeous brunette girl - well, woman really, since she looks a few years older than them - smiling down at her while she looks up at him with the softest look Emma has ever seen on anyone’s face. They’re sitting outside a pub and it’s golden hour and they just look so fucking happy and Emma feels sick.

Why wouldn’t Killian tell her that he found a hot older British girlfriend?

“ _Did Killian tell you he has a girlfriend?_ ” She texts Neal, and clicks on the girl’s profile while she waits for his response. Her name is Milah and she seems to be in college - university, whatever - and so cool. There are pictures of her playing drums and smoking pot in Amsterdam and laying on a boat in a bikini like every cool hot girl in a movie. Of course Killian would like her. Of course he’s into sexy older women.

“ _He sent me a snap like a week ago of him doing shots with some girl but I didn’t realize it is serious. Suspicious that he didn’t tell either of us. Maybe he’s a spy?_ ”

Emma laughs and takes her first deep breath in what felt like an hour but is really probably three minutes. “ _Probably didn’t want us to tell her that he’s only 18 because they put him in fifth grade again when he moved here._ ”

_“My spy theory is more interesting.”_

_“Is he spying for the US or for England?”_

_“The US of course.”_

_“This sounds more like you’re trying to finish your homework over texts. Get back to work.”_

Emma locks her phone and leaves it on the kitchen counter. Maybe she needs a social media detox if she’s going to let one silly little Instagram post bother her so much.

—-

Emma somehow gets dragged into helping Regina with her Class President campaign all of Saturday, her last true day of freedom before senior year starts. Robin is there too, but he’s mostly playing Zelda on his Switch while lying on the bed and giving completely unhelpful commentary that somehow still makes Regina smile even though she’d kill anyone else for saying the same things. It’s kinda cute.

“You need to use different combinations of the colors on each poster,” Regina says, snatching the blue marker out of Emma’s hand. “If I wanted them to all look the same I would’ve just made copies.”

“Why _aren’t_ we doing this on a computer?” Emma asks while she waits for Regina to give her the appropriate colored marker. “Wouldn’t that be easier?”

“Easier doesn’t mean better, Swan.” Regina hands her a black marker, nodding at her to continue with the poster. “The buttons will be made in Photoshop, these need a more unique feel. I’m trying to achieve a real classic Americana election vibe.”

Emma laughs a little. “You’ve put a lot of thought into this, huh? I’m sure you’ll kill it.”

Regina smirks. “Of course I will. I’m the only acceptable option.”

“Damn right,” Robin chimes in from his spot on the bed, not even looking up.

Emma’s phone rings then, Killian’s picture lighting up the screen. “Take that in the hall, I don’t want to hear you two crying over being in the same country again,” Regina says, waving her hand dismissively in Emma’s general direction.

Emma rolls her eyes but listens, answering the phone after she closes the door behind her. “Hey, Killian.” She’s smiling despite herself. Dammit.

“Emma,” he says, more of a sigh than a word. “I’m home.”

“I figured. Happy to be back?”

“Very.” He pauses, and Emma can hear him yawning. “Missed my bed and you being only a few meters away.”

“I’m actually at Regina’s now, so I’m a little further than that,” Emma teases. “You sound tired.”

“Aye, I couldn’t sleep on the plane and my body has no idea what time it is. Don’t know if I’m supposed to be at the pub or sleeping or eating dinner now.” He laughs a little, and Emma smiles. “Might turn in now and we can see each other tomorrow.”

Emma pauses, chewing on her lip. She misses him so much, and he’s so close, but for some reason, the thought of seeing him makes her feel sick. Maybe it’s just nerves that they’ve changed this summer. Maybe it’s because he didn’t tell her had a girlfriend. Maybe it’s all of the above and something else. “I’m pretty busy tomorrow, actually. We can just see each other at school.”

“Oh.” They’re both totally silent for a second. “Yeah, of course, love, that’s fine. My dad probably wants to take me on the boat for some last minute father-son bonding, anyways. Monday is fine.”

“Okay, I’ll let you go,” Emma says, and hangs up without saying goodbye.

“You heading over Jones’s place?” Robin asks when she comes back in the room.

Emma shakes her head, folding her legs and sitting back on Regina’s plush carpet. “He’s tired.”

“Too tired to see you?” Regina asks, and Emma can tell she doesn’t believe her. Emma really hates how well Regina can read her. “You sure that was Killian Jones on the phone?”

“Yes. Shut up.” Emma reaches over and grabs the black marker out of Regina’s hand. “Let’s just finish this up so I can get home for dinner.”

Emma makes it home for a late dinner, but tells her parents she’s not hungry and goes straight to her room. She’s never been great at deciphering her complex emotions. Happy, sad, angry? She’s good with those. But hurt, or betrayed, or lonely, or scared, or jealous? Those have never made sense to her. So she shoves them down and ignores them and tries to cover them with simple emotions. It’s easier to be mad at Killian than anything else.

She leaves her light off and stands by her window, looking out at her backyard in the fading golden sunlight, the sky in deep orange flames. Summer is almost over, darkness falling earlier and earlier, and she watches it wash over the old swing set back there, her mother’s small garden, the tree she used to climb when she was small.

She’s not sure how long she stands there, watching the light fade, but she notices when a light in the distance flicks on, drawing her attention away from her own backyard and over the fence, across the Jones’s property, to Killian’s window. It’s always been a bit too far for them to be able to see each other, but they’ve tried to use their bedroom lights to communicate in the past, even going through a weird Morse Code phase. She watches his shadow move in front of the window, imagines him in his so-familiar room, getting ready for bed, exhausted from his long travel day.

His light turns off again after a few minutes, and Emma closes her eyes, exhaling. For a split second, too fast for her to even stop the thought, she wonders if he’s going to dream about her or Milah tonight.

She crawls in bed, pulls the covers over her head, and tries to wish that she could just sleep until Monday. She’s never been very good at wishing.

——

“The first day of senior year,” Robin yells, jumping out of Regina’s sleek black Mercedes in the school parking lot.

“It’s seven fucking thirty, mate, shut the fuck up,” Will yells back across the parking lot, making the rest of the students there that early, including Emma, laugh.

“Language, Mr. Scarlet,” Mr. Nolan says, walking past the group. He’s smiling, though, as everyone’s favorite science teacher in the world would be. “You guys might be seniors, but the rules still apply.”

When he passes, Emma turns back towards Robin and Regina. “I never asked what home room you guys are in,” she asks, locking her car. As if anyone would steal that piece of shit.

“I’ve got the nun,” Robin says sadly, even though Mother Superior is a great teacher.

“Me too,” Killian says, appearing out of nowhere and leaning against the back of Emma’s car.

“Anyone else have Miss Blanchard?” Emma asks, ignoring Killian, even though she can feel his eyes on her.

“I do.” Emma turns, and Ruby is standing there, holding hands with her girlfriend. Her and Dorothy had shocked everyone by showing up to junior prom together, but despite Storybrooke being small town Maine, the type of town with a reputation for being close-minded, literally everyone had supported the two of them, even starting a petition so that the school could elect two prom queens the next year. It had all been very progressive.

“Perfect,” Emma says, stepping forward to give Ruby a quick hug. Her sneaker is touching Killian’s boot. She doesn’t know why she’s so aware of that. “Let’s walk together.” Ruby lets go of Dorothy’s hand and links her arm with Emma, laughing.

“Swan?” Killian says behind her. Emma keeps walking.

—-

Emma gets a hall pass during History class, never great at paying attention for the whole day. She stops at her locker to check her texts - a picture of a pigeon eating a bagel from Neal - and heads towards the bathroom. Two more classes and the first day of senior year is over, only one-hundred-and-eighty-something to go. She’s not sure whether she’s happy or sad about that.

“Swan.” Someone grabs her elbow, gently but insistently, before she can even process the voice, and she whirls around to face them.

“Killian,” she breaths, heart racing. “What the hell are you doing?”

“I saw you walk by and I had to stop you,” he replies. His brow is knitted together with confusion and Emma has to resist the urge to roll her eyes. She’s not sure why she’s so annoyed by everything he does, but she just is.

“I don’t know why you’re being so weird. Just to talk to me whenever.”

“Me? Nah, it’s you who’s being weird.” Emma opens her mouth to argue and Killian holds up his hand. “I don’t know what I did to upset you, but whatever it was, I’m sorry. Truly. I would never hurt you or make you mad on purpose. You know that.”

She opens her mouth again, a bitchy comment on the tip of her tongue, and then she stops. Closes her mouth. Takes a deep breath. “It’s not you, really. I’ve just been freaking out a little about all this growing up stuff. Growing apart and moving on. And then when you didn’t tell me you got a girlfriend, it just felt...like I was right.” She shrugs, looks down. “Like we had grown apart.”

Killian takes a step forward, reaching out for her shoulder, but she takes a step back. “That’s not why I didn’t tell you. I kept meaning to. But I never knew what to say.”

“It’s not a big deal, like, it happens. I don’t care if you have a girlfriend, obviously.”

“Obviously,” he agrees.

“I just remember a few years ago when I would’ve been your first call when you met a cute girl. I miss us being that close, before Neal and England and all that stupid stuff distracted us, y’know? I want us to be like that again.” She feels shaky, vulnerable like she absolutely should not be in the hallway of her high school, but Killian’s face just softens and she doesn’t feel so scared.

“I miss that too, Emma,” he says, and opens his arms for a hug. She laughs and steps into it, tucking her chin over his shoulder. “Senior year is going to be our best year yet, I swear to you.”

“Operation Best Friend,” Emma whispers, giving him a quick squeeze before pulling back. “Now let’s get back to class before we get suspended.”

—-

It’s not like Emma forgets every weird feeling she had after one hug, but it gets easier to ignore any negative emotion when she’s with Killian every day. He always knows how to make her smile, even when she doesn’t want to.

“I thought you were mad at Killian,” Regina says under her breath a few days later. They’re in English, Miss Blanchard writing something on the board. Emma looks over at her friend and raises an eyebrow. “Weren’t you? Now you two are hanging out constantly again.”

“I wasn’t mad at him, I was just mad at life,” Emma says simply. She shrugs. No big deal. It’s not like they’ve never had fights before, in a decade of friendship.

“Seemed like more than that to me, but if you say so.”

Miss Blanchard seems half-distracted for the rest of class, and Emma can’t help but ask Regina about it at lunch. Regina knows everything.

“Miss Blanchard was being weird, right?” Emma asks, dropping down on the bench next to Killian, who immediately hands her his second cookie.

“Wait, you haven’t heard?” When Emma just raises her eyebrows, Regina breaks out in what could almost be called a grin, if she was someone who grinned. “I love knowing all the good gossip. She’s hooking up with Mr. Nolan.”

“Isn’t he married?” Robin asks, stealing a fry from Regina’s plate.

“He was, they got divorced months ago. My mother told me. And now this “ she claps her hands together, looking like she’s holding court. “It’s all very hush hush of course, but they are kind of sweet together, if you like that sort of sickly thing.”

Robin swings his arm over her shoulder. “My girlfriend, ever the romantic.” He presses a kiss to her temple while Regina rolls her eyes, but Emma can see the way she melts into it. If anyone is sickly sweet, it’s them.

“Damn, Jones, life sure sucks for those of us in long distance relationships, huh?” Emma turns her attention to Killian beside her. “No one to make out with on lunch break or whatever kids these days do.”

Killian laughs. “Let’s not talk too much of kissing when those we want to kiss are so many miles away, eh? No one here for us.” And he cocks one eyebrow, looking up at her through his impossibly long lashes, and her stomach does a backflip.

Fuck.

No.

Absolutely fucking not.

Emma stands, almost elbowing Dorothy in the head in her haste. “I just realized I have to go. My mom needs me to -“ she stops herself, swallows. And then just walks out of the cafeteria.

She keeps walking until she’s pushing open the door to the farthest stairwell in the school. It’s cooler there, and dimly lit. No one uses these stairs unless they have to run from the art rooms to the computer lab, and it’s quiet. She lowers herself onto the floor, back against the wall, cool concrete pressing through her shirt.

It’s Killian. Not someone she can have weird stomach swoops over. He is her best friend in the whole world and she has a boyfriend and he has a girlfriend and she can absolutely not ever possibly think of him that way.

Except that, maybe, she does.

She squeezes her eyes shut, and remembers how upset she was that he had a girlfriend. How sad she was when he left for the summer. How happy she felt at junior prom when he “cut in” on Neal and spun her all around the gymnasium. How safe she felt when he tucked her into bed that time she got too drunk, taking off her boots for her and promising to stay with her in case she choked on her puke in the night.

That’s just friendship, she tells herself, opening her eyes to snap herself out of it. Friends are supposed to make you happy.

And sure, sometimes when he bites his lips, she can’t help but notice how soft they look. And when he hugs her, his hands splayed across her back, she wants to just sink into the warmth. And maybe, once or twice, when he called her “love,” she let herself believe it meant something more.

Emma screams, then. Not too loud, just loud enough. A release.

“Is someone in here?”

Emma stands quickly, backing away from the railing as footsteps came up the stairs. “Sorry, sorry,” she mutters, before she even sees who it is.

“Oh, Emma,” Mrs, Blanchard says, voice soft and warm, full of concern. “Are you okay?”

“Just dumb teenage stuff, don’t worry about it.” Emma starts wiping the dirt off her jeans, avoiding eye contact.

“Whatever it is, it isn’t dumb,” Mrs, Blanchard says firmly. “I’m almost thirty and still making plenty of mistakes. Emotions are valid no matter what your age.”

Emma sighs. “Just realized I might have feelings for my best friend, so that’s not great.”

They’re both quiet for a moment, and then Miss Blanchard smiles. “A year ago, I was in love with a married man. Sometimes things work out.”

The bell rings, and Miss Blanchard herds Emma out of the staircase, pointing her back towards class. Emma knows she’s wrong, that this won’t work out, because Emma isn’t lucky enough for that, but she lets that crazy thought power her through the rest of the day.

“What happened at lunch?” is the first thing Killian says when he closes her car door behind him. And now she’s trapped, driving them home, like a big idiot.

“Got my period,” she says. Killian laughs, but raises his hands in surrender when she shoots him a look. “Being a girl is weird sometimes, Jones.”

“I’m sure it is.” He fiddles with the dial on the radio for a minute, and then turns it off. “You know you can tell me if it’s more than that, right, Swan?”

Emma swallows a lump in her throat and nods. “Yes, of course I know. It’s really not that serious. I promise.”

He keeps watching her the rest of the short drive back to their houses, and Emma has to remind herself to breathe.

——

Regina is elected Senior Class President in a landslide, obviously. Even the people who might not like her know she’s the best one for the job. Or - as Killian helpfully suggests - are too scared to vote for anyone else. She throws a victory party that night, a small thing at her house with her dad upstairs and only champagne to drink.

“It’s a victory _celebration_ , not a party,” she explains to Will when he complains. “You’re more than welcome to leave, William, I don’t really like you.”

“Okay, that’s enough of the bubbly for you, my dear,” Robin says, directing her away from his friend before Will gets a chance to say something even nastier in response.

Emma and Killian sit on the small couch in the living room, trying not to laugh. His thigh is pressed against hers, and she is too aware of it, but doesn’t know how to move away. She’s genuinely not sure if things are better or worse now that she’s half-admitted to herself that maybe she has a tiny crush on Killian Jones.

The “celebration” wraps up by eleven, just Emma and Robin staying behind to help clean up. Killian catches a ride home with Regina’s weird friend who goes to the private school the next town over, Jefferson. Emma has only met him three times now, but every time he’s stone cold sober, insisting that the only time he indulges in mind-altering substances is to have a spiritual experience. Will says he deals shrooms. But he doesn’t drink, so Emma tells him, very seriously, that she trusts him to get her best friend home.

They’re all a bit drunker off the champagne than they had expected.

“I’ll miss you, Emma Swan,” Killian says seriously, backing out the front door. Emma blushes.

“When are you guys gonna get together?” Robin asks, standing behind her with a trash bag.

“What he said,” Regina yells from the other room. “I’m bored of this.”

“I’m very happy with my current boyfriend, thank you,” Emma says, heading back into the living room. She starts fixing the pillows on the couch, waiting for Regina’s no doubt sarcastic reply.

“Listen, everyone loves Neal,” Regina says simply. She’s holding a recycling bin full of bottles in one hand, other on her hip. “But he’s off at college and Killian is right here and if I have to watch you two make eyes at each other for the rest of the school year and act like little lovesick puppies I’m gonna scream.”

“We do not act like lovesick puppies,” Emma argues, and Regina just shakes her head. “Even if - and that’s a big if - I was into him, he’s so not into me. His type is hot foreign girls, clearly.”

“You’re literally insufferable. I miss when we weren’t friends and I didn’t have to talk to you.” Regina turns on her heel, heading back into the kitchen with the recycling.

“Don’t mind my girlfriend,” Robin says when he comes back in the room. “She doesn’t want anyone to know it, but she’s a hopeless romantic. Just wants everyone to have their happy ending.”

“Happy endings aren’t real, man, I’m sorry,” Emma says, and shrugs. Robin looks at her sadly, and Emma groans. “Tell Regina I had to get home.”

Emma walks back to her house, a bit of a long walk in the crisp autumn air, but she needs it. Her friends are dumb. Killian would never think of her like that, and if he did, he would’ve done something about it by now. He’s not someone who just lets things happen to him, he always goes out and gets what he wants. So he doesn’t want her.

She pulls out her phone as she walks, sending Neal a quick text. “The champagne party was a success. Miss you.”

And she does miss him, no matter what Regina or anyone else thinks. Honestly.

—-

Neals calls almost every Sunday, their little ritual to keep in touch and not just rely on text messages and social media to keep up with each other. Emma takes a break from homework to flop on her bed, listening to his stories. College is so much more interesting than high school, and it almost makes her excited to graduate and go off onto the next adventure. Almost.

“How’s everything there?” He asks after rambling about his sociology class for twenty minutes. “It’s hard to keep in touch with everyone who isn’t you.”

“Well, I am the best person here, so.” They both laugh. “It’s all pretty much the same. Regina won the election, which I’m sure you saw. Ruby and I have classes together again this year so we’ve been talking a bit more. Apparently Miss Blanchard and Mr. Nolan are dating, which is so weird and I never wanted to think about teachers having personal lives.”

“Is Killian good? He hasn’t responded to my texts in over a week, I think.”

Emma stares at the ceiling, not wanting to talk about Killian with Neal, but, well, she can’t ignore the question. “He seems fine to me. I think he’s just bad at communication.”

Neal laughs a little. “I didn’t even mention the craziest thing that happened here, actually. This guy on my floor goes to that same prep school as Regina’s weird friend, Washington or whatever?”

“Jefferson? What a small world.”

“Yeah, I know. And get this, he says that every year at that school these weird amateur creepy sex tapes go around, like personal ones. And he swears they’re coming from Storybrooke.”

“No way,” Emma says, sitting up. “That’s disgusting.”

“I bet it’s my dad,” Neal says thoughtfully, like that’s at all a normal thing to think about your father.

“You think your dad is selling illegal sex tapes?”

“We saw how much illegal shit he had in his shop last year. I wouldn’t be surprised.”

Emma groans. “Neal, you can’t decide that your dad is responsible for every single bad thing in the world. Like, just call the sheriff here with a tip or something.”

“I’ve got a better idea.” Emma knows it’s a worse idea. “You and Killian should break into my dad’s shop and see if there’s a secret back room full of sex tapes.”

“You’re not serious.”

“I’m completely serious. Please? Just for my peace of mind, Emma.”

Emma agrees and Neal tells her the plan and she hates every second of it, but she knows his relationship with his dad is complicated and if this helps even a little bit with making him not believe Mr. Gold is literal evil, then she’ll do it.

—-

“Now Neal is sure Mr. Gold isn’t here?”

“He said he’s at a meeting. Neal is tracking his phone, apparently.”

They’re at the back door of the pawn shop, Killian looking around while Emma bends over the lock. When she had asked, Killian agreed immediately, eyes lighting up at the thought of doing something mischievous again. It had been a while since they had risked getting arrested together.

“And what exactly are we hoping to find here?” Killian asks as Emma finally gets the door open.

“I’m hoping to find nothing. Neal wants us to find a secret stash of porn.”

Killian raises his eyebrows, following Emma inside. She quickly types in the code that Neal gave her on the alarm pad - yes, Mr. Gold had changed it after they broke in last year, but Neal had managed to get the new one almost immediately - and breathes a sigh of relief when it turns green.

“Are we about to watch porn together, love? That’s a bonding experience I wasn’t expecting.” Killian looks like such a cocky little shit and Emma punches his shoulder, hard, before turning away. She’s pretty sure she’s red right up to the tips of her ears and is thankful for the darkness in the shop.

“We’re not watching anything, we’re just like. Looking at them. I don’t know.”

They move through the shop, opening up cabinets and trunks and closet doors, finding plenty of weird and gross old objects, but nothing like an entire secret video library. There’s what looks like a real hand in a jar, and an old tea set, and a tiny vault behind a picture frame, but no porn. Emma even checks the office and the bathroom, but they’re clean.

“Either Mr. Gold has a secret room hidden under the floorboards or something, or there’s nothing here.”

“There’s plenty here,” Killian argues, picking up a beautiful antique curved sword, “but no porn.”

“Don’t sound so disappointed,” Emma says, and they both laugh.

The doorknob rattles.

“Run,” Killian hisses, dropping the sword back where he found it and practically shoving Emma towards the back. She can’t get traction on the freshly-washed wood floor in her stupid converse, so Killian guides her, hand on her elbow. They practically tumble out the back door, closing it behind them at almost the exact second the light inside the shop turns on. They don’t stop running until they’re two blocks away, Killian stopping to lean against a streetlight.

“Well that was quite thrilling,” he says, smirking, and Emma rolls her eyes. “We needed a little heart pounding adventure after finding nothing in there.”

Emma pulls her phone out of her pocket, and sure enough, there’s a text from Neal seven minutes ago letting her know his dad had left the restaurant. She doesn’t know how she let herself get so distracted in there.

Killian still has his hand wrapped around her forearm, and Emma pulls away, making it look like a shiver. “You cold, love? Do you want my jacket?”

The “yes” is on the tip of her tongue, imagining being wrapped up in Killian’s warmth, breathing him in, like the longest, best hug, but she shakes her head. “I’m fine. Let’s just go home so I can tell my boyfriend he’s an idiot.”

“Aye, of course,” Killian says with a sharp nod. “I should probably…call Milah or something. I’m a pretty shit boyfriend.”

“I don’t believe that. I think you’d be the best boyfriend.” They’re walking now, heading in the direction of their houses, and Emma won’t look at him.

“Maybe to someone who was in the same timezone, or the right someone,” he says, and Emma glances over at him. He’s not looking back at her.

“Is Milah not the right someone?” She immediately hates herself for asking, but isn’t that a normal friend question? Wouldn’t it be weirder if she didn’t ask?

“She’s quite lovely, but.” He shrugs. “We don’t know each other too well and it’s a lot of work to keep girls happy, I guess.”

Emma bumps him with her hip. “You keep me happy.”

“That’s different, Swan,” he says softly, looking at her then. “We’re not -“

“No, of course, obviously,” she rushes out, holding her hands up. “I just meant. You’re a good person. Fun to be around. From my perspective as your friend, I think Milah should be very happy that she gets to be with you.”

They’re silent for a moment, almost home. “Thank you,” he says finally, voice soft and serious. “You always know the right thing to say.”

“That’s my job,” she says, forcing out a laugh that hopefully sounds totally natural. “We’re here.” She points at his house behind them, taking a step away from him and shoving her hands in her back pockets. “See you at school tomorrow.”

“Goodnight, Emma,” Killian says, not moving. And then he takes a small step forward and presses the softest breath of a kiss to her forehead.

Emma burns and Killian just walks away, into his house, no idea what he just did to her. Her face is hot, tears suddenly prickling at the corner of her eyes, and she has to tell her limbs to move, cut through the neighbor’s yard to take the shortcut back to her house, where she almost forgets how to use keys, open doors, walk up the stairs to her room. She crawls in bed, fully dressed, and pulls the covers over her head, phone forgotten, Neal forgotten, the whole mission forgotten.

She presses her fingertips against her forehead and tries not to cry stupid teenage girl tears. She almost succeeds.

—-

The first gift she gets for her eighteenth birthday is from Neal, arriving in the mail a few days early. He says she can open it if she does it over FaceTime, so she does. It’s a book he loves, which is sweet, and an NYU sweatshirt, and the nicest birthday card she’s ever received. Very Neal.

Emma has never really loved her birthday, so she doesn’t make a big deal of it, even though everyone tells her she should. She invites Killian, Regina, Robin, and Ruby over for pizza night with her family, and her mom even gets the big projector out of storage and sets it up with a screen in the backyard for them to watch horror movies for as long as they want. There are pillows and blankets and popcorn, and it’s the kind of quiet acknowledgment of the day that Emma prefers.

Killian brings his flask, of course, and when Emma’s parents go to bed after the first movie, he pulls it out and passes it around. “Can’t believe our little Swan is finally legal,” he muses, handing her the flask

Emma rolls her eyes and takes a long swig of the rum. It burns all the way down, settling warm and heavy in her stomach. “I’m the second oldest person here, Killian.”

Regina turns up her nose at the rum and passes it to Robin. “Yes, we’re all so excited that Emma can buy us lottery tickets.”

Killian throws his arm over Emma’s shoulder, fitting her tight against him. “We’re all grown up now.”

Emma looks up at him. “I don’t wanna grow up,” she says softly, just loud enough for him to hear.

“Oh, love, we’ll make being grown up fun, I swear.” He reaches up and brushes a tendril of her blonde hair out of her face, and Emma smiles.

“Robin, I have a headache,” Regina says suddenly.

“Do you want a paracetamol?” He asks, still nursing Killian’s flask.

“No, take me home,” Regina insists. Emma looks away from Killian’s too-blue eyes, and Regina is already standing.

“Is the party over?” Killian asks. “We have a whole film to watch! It’s very scary!”

“No, you’re fine.” Regina looks at Emma, raising her eyebrows way too high. Emma groans. “We’re just gonna go. You guys have fun.” She grabs the flask out of Robin’s hand, tossing it towards them, and then drags both Robin and Ruby back into the house to leave.

“That was weird,” Killian says, when the back door has closed behind them.

Emma ducks out from under his arm and stands, turning to face him. “You know Regina, she’s always weird.” She shrugs, playing at casual. “You can head out too if you want, it’s getting late.”

“I was _promised_ a movie marathon, and I don’t think one movie qualifies.” He pats the pillows next to him. “Pop the next one in and let’s enjoy the rest of your birthday.”

Emma grins despite herself and follows instructions, setting the projector up to play Cabin in the Woods. She settles down next to Killian - a bit further away this time - and hits play. He throws a blanket over both of them, and Emma exhales, relaxing into it. Regina needs to stop trying to play weird cheat-on-your-significant-other matchmaker games, yes, but it’s not like Emma is going to complain about spending her birthday with her best friend. It’s mostly just been the two of them at their birthdays for as long as she can remember, whether they were at a roller rink or a haunted house or a sleepover in this same backyard. Just because she might have a tiny inconvenient crush on him doesn’t mean she can’t enjoy this night for what it is.

Killian falls asleep near the end of the movie, head on the pillow next to her. It’s not even midnight yet, but he’s been pretty exhausted lately, juggling work and school and a social life. Emma watches him while the credits roll. and he looks so much the way he always has, features a little more defined, shadow of a stubble along his jaw. She doesn’t know why she couldn’t have noticed all these things about him years ago, when they were both single, but her life has never been particularly easy. At least on the scale of bad life shit, this is near the bottom. It’s not too bad, really.

“Are you watching me sleep?” He asks, eyes not even open.

“Making sure you’re not dead.”

He laughs, and reaches up to her to tug her down next to him. “Happy Birthday, Emma,” he breathes, face inches away from hers.

“Goodnight, Killian,” she whispers back, and closes her eyes.

——

Emma gets grounded for a week for falling asleep with a boy or some nonsense, as if it’s not just Killian, who has literally slept in her bedroom before. Her dad says it’s different now that they’re teenagers, and Emma just rolls her eyes.

It doesn’t really matter, because the grounding is over by Halloween, so she can still go to the party. She’s not even sure who’s throwing it, but basically every upperclassman is invited. Regina calls it the social event of the season at lunch the day before, and even though Emma laughs at her, she’s not wrong.

Emma famously doesn’t ever try on Halloween, at least not since she got past the easy Disney princess stage in about third grade. She’s been different versions of half-assed cats probably four times. Last year, her and Neal went as the Men in Black, literally walking around the party in suits with sunglasses on, because neither of them had planned ahead at all.

This year, she tries a little bit. She orders something off the internet a few weeks in advance, buys some fake blood at a party store, does her hair. It might not be what someone like Regina considers effort, but Regina handmade a complex Evil Queen costume freshman year and wore it to school, so that’s just not a realistic goalpost for anyone.

Emma is putting the finishing touches on her blood-spattered jumpsuit, because if she’s going to be The Bride from Kill Bill, she’s definitely being the covered in blood version, when her doorbell rings. It’s almost nine, and that’s when the party starts and therefore when Killian was going to meet her, so she drops her fake blood and bounds down the stairs.

“You look bloody brilliant,” Killian says with a grin when she opens the door, and she smacks him. “What? I thought it was clever!”

She laughs and grabs the sleeve of the leather duster he’s wearing to pull him inside. “You’re so annoying. What are you supposed to be?”

He holds up his left hand, where there’s a plastic hook sticking out of his sleeve. “Captain Hook, obviously.”

Emma looks him up and down, taking in his boots and leather pants, half-buttoned shirt and necklaces, leather jacket and an earring dangling from his right ear. “Like a sexy Captain Hook? Where’s the wig and the mustache?”

“We’ll circle back to you calling me sexy, Swan, but I do need your help with the mustache.” He reaches into his pocket and pulls out one of those ridiculous costume mustaches, all felt and curling stupidly. “This is supposed to be sticky, but I can’t figure the damn thing out.”

“I’ve got you,” she says. “I’ve gotta help Killian with his costume and then we’re leaving,” she yells to her parents in the living room, waiting for their acknowledgment before grabbing his hand and dragging him upstairs. She leads him into her bathroom and instructs him to sit on the counter.

Killian hops up, letting his legs swing so his boots knock against the cabinets. “Hoping that’s fake blood in the shower and I didn’t almost walk in on you committing a gruesome murder.”

Emma shakes her head, letting out a soft laugh. “It’s not time for your jokes, Jones, it’s time to glue a stupid mustache to your face.”

“So sorry, love, please have your way with me.”

She spreads eyelash glue across his top lip, shocked that he’s not protesting, and then presses the felt mustache to it. “This will probably come off in your beer but I’m sure you can get a selfie or two with it first.” Killian meets her eyes steadily while she holds her finger against the mustache, waiting for the glue to dry, and she has to swallow a few times before she can remember how to form words.

“Thanks, love, you’re a life saver,” Killian says with a quick nod. He moves to hop off the counter and Emma puts her hand on his knee, stopping him.

“Do you want to go full Jack Sparrow and wear some eyeliner?” She says, holding up a black pencil, and Killian grins.

—-

Putting eyeliner on Killian was gentle torture, yes, but he does look damn good, she was right. Her mom makes them pose for a few pictures, and they do it, rolling their eyes and making stupid faces at each other. His eyes look bluer now, and Emma has to keep reminding herself not to drown in them.

It’s almost ten by the time they make it to the party, and it’s already crazy. The house is huge, front door open and music blaring out into the night, but all of the neighbors are far enough away that they probably can’t even hear it. They’re in the _rich_ rich part of town now.

Someone is lying in the grass, wearing what looks to be a burgundy suit and a top hat, and Emma wonders if he’s already passed out drunk on the lawn less than an hour into the party. As they approach however, he jumps to his feet, takes off his hat, and bows at them. It’s Jefferson, and his over-dramatic “enjoy the party” makes it clear that this is his house. That explains pretty much everything about him.

The front walk is decorated with cobwebs and pumpkins, twinkly orange lights guiding them from the sidewalk to the front door. There are people Emma has never seen before all over the place, probably private school kids, so Emma keeps her eyes open for their friends.

“I’ll go get us drinks,” Killian whispers, breath warm on her neck, and she nods, moving through the house. She went to a different party last year, a smaller thing with Neal and Peter’s friends, so she’s never been in this house before and it’s so huge she’s a little nervous she’s going to get lost, or at the very least, never find a single person she knows ever again.

The music gets louder the deeper into the house she goes, passing a formal living room where someone dressed like Peppa Pig is making out with someone dressed like Freddie Krueger, an office full of smoke and stoners, and finally, a large open room, dining room at one end with food and drinks, family room with the couches pushed against the wall to form a sort of dance floor on the other, giant expensive speakers connected to a laptop in the middle. Somehow, over the noise, she hears Will’s accent, and turns towards it. Her friends are all standing together, drinks in hands, laughing and talking loudly over the music.

“Hey guys,” she says, walking up and throwing an arm over Robin’s shoulder, who cheers. He’s clearly already a few beers in. He’s dressed as an angel, white toga and wings and a little halo headband, and Regina is next to him, in head-to-toe skin-tight red, sparkly devil horns nestled in her dark hair. Regina really knows how to do Halloween.

“You actually tried this year, Emma, I’m so impressed,” Regina says, smirking over her Solo cup, lips the same bright red as the cup.

Emma takes a step back and bends into a mocking curtsy, making everyone laugh. Killian comes up behind her then, carefully holding two cups in one hand while his plastic hook just waves around uselessly, so she takes the drinks with a nod of thanks. The music is loud, everyone is laughing and drinking, and Emma soaks it all in, making sure she enjoys the last Halloween party of high school.

Two drinks later - the second one much more rum than coke - Emma steps out into the backyard to answer a drunken FaceTime from Neal. The backyard is quieter, but still rowdy, with a group of football players playing beer pong, so she walks towards a bench near a garden and sits down.

“Happy Halloween,” Neal yells when she answers. He has some sort of face paint on, but it’s pretty dark and loud where he is, so Emma can’t figure out what he’s supposed to be. “Wish you were at this party!”

“I’m at a different party so it’s almost like we’re partying together,” she assures him and he smiles. “You look like you’re having a good night.”

They talk for a few minutes, Neal telling her ridiculous stories and then taking the phone around the room to introduce her to his friends. It’s cool outside, and Emma is thankful for her long-sleeved jumpsuit, for the liquor warming her from the inside out. Eventually, Neal has to go to play beer pong, telling Emma he loves her, and she presses a kiss to the camera to say goodbye.

Inside, her friends are gone, of course, and she groans. She grabs another drink, stopping to talk to Mulan for a minute in the kitchen. She finds Robin and Regina sitting on the stairs, talking with his friends, and she doesn’t really want to interrupt. Killian couldn’t be far.

Emma finally finds him in the office, sitting in an expensive-looking wingback armchair, smoking a joint, felt mustache already lost just as she predicted. He’s talking to everyone around him, but he also seems off in his own little world, and Emma lets herself watch him for a moment before stepping into the room. He smiles a slow, stoned smile at her when he sees her and stands up.

“Swan. Lovely to see you again.” His voice is slow, relaxed and warm, and it draws Emma closer. “How is our dear old Neal?”

Emma steps a little closer to him, angling her body slightly to cut them off from the rest of the people in the room who are all lounging about on the desk or the chaise lounge. “Very drunk, very sweet. The usual Halloween Neal.”

“Very drunk! I’ll toast to that!” Killian raises the joint, since he’s not holding a drink, and Emma laughs. “We all missed you terribly while you were gone, love.”

Emma shakes her head, smiling. “Think maybe that was just you, Jones.”

“Aye, I can’t lie. I missed you most of all.” Emma takes another small step forward, about to reach out for the joint, when Killian smirks and takes a hit himself, closing his eyes and breathing in. And suddenly, his arm is around her, that stupid plastic hook against the small of her back, pulling her against him, so close their noses bump. And then he’s exhaling the smoke, and she’s opening her mouth, breathing it in, and the whole room is spinning, dancing around them and all Emma can feel is his body.

She takes a step back, and Killian drops his arm, taking a step back himself. He hands her the joint, then, and she takes two quick hits before she can even attempt a sentence.

“Do you want to help me find our friends?” She asks, trying to ignore how shaky her voice sounds in her ears.

“And we need to find more rum,” he agrees with a curt nod.

Emma knows she’s delusional, is hearing what she wants, but his voice sounds rough, like maybe it’s a little hard for him to be normal after all that, too.

——

“But if we leave now, we won’t know how the party ends!”

Robin is arguing, red-faced and drunk and grinning, but Regina has already called a driver. She’s wearing Robin’s halo headband, right next to her horns, has been ever since he almost lost it in the fire pit an hour ago, and it’s creating this really funny image. Half-angel, half-devil. Emma thinks that really sums up Regina.

“The party ends as they always do, dear,” Regina says calmly, her mannerisms getting overly posh as she gets drunk, like clockwork. “with people vomiting and passing out in Jefferson’s rose bushes. We’re getting out while the getting’s good.”

It’s almost one, and some people have started to leave, or at the very least, moved upstairs to hook up. The music is still on, but a bit quieter, alcohol is still flowing, but less people have drinks. Emma has stolen some of Killian’s jewelry, wearing a huge skull necklace and a ring on her thumb, and she can’t even remember when she got them. Probably three drinks ago.

Will made out with Belle, the student council secretary who is in all honors classes, for an hour, and then chugged two beers and threw up on the beer pong table. Emma got to talk to Dorothy for more than two minutes, which was very exciting. Killian and Robin won a game of beer pong, pre-puke. Regina gave a drunken student council interview to Sidney Glass for the school newspaper that was better than anything Emma could’ve done sober. Overall, it was a successful night.

Once Regina and Robin leave, other people start heading out too. Emma wants to stay, enjoy her 3 am curfew, and Killian, the boy with no curfew, offers to stay with her, but once everyone they know leaves, it’s not very exciting. Emma can only eat so many fancy hors d'oeuvres before even that starts to get boring.

“I’ll walk you home like a gentleman,” Killian says when they’ve walked out the front door, offering his arm, hook and all. Emma laughs and takes it, feeling like a princess as they walk down the path towards the sidewalk.

Emma is very drunk and Killian is solid and warm and strong next to her, so she leans against him as they walk, letting him support her. She can barely follow their conversation, feeling like she’s floating down the sidewalk. He’s saying something about costumes, and then about that weird song that played that they all laughed about, and then complaining about how bad American beer is. She doesn’t know if the thoughts are connected, but his voice is nice to listen to.

Eventually, Emma glances up and realizes they’re just a few blocks from their houses, and she twirls away from him to look up at the familiar trees, most of them without their leaves as they sway in the wind. She sways with them for a second, and Killian laughs. “This was a really good Halloween,” she says, head thrown back to look at the stars.

“It was,” Killian agrees, and then they’re both quiet for a minute, like they don’t want it to be over. He leans against a lamp post, body heavy against it, bathed in warm golden light. “You look beautiful.” Emma looks at him and blushes, looking down. “Hey,” he says firmly, before reaching out and using his hook to tug on the necklace she’s wearing. She stumbles closer, tripping over her feet a little, and he has to put his hand on her elbow to steady her.

“Don’t call me beautiful, I’m embarrassed.” She covers her eyes with her hands, and Killian reaches up, tugging her left hand down, and then just holding it. “What was your favorite part of the party?”

“This part.” Killian’s voice is soft, and it makes Emma’s stomach twist.

“Oh, stop it, save your stupid lines for someone else.”

“They don’t work on you, eh?” Killian asks with a quirk of his eyebrow, and Emma swallows hard. He’s still holding her hand.

“Maybe they do,” she says, trying to keep her voice light, but he can see right through her. He can always see right through her.

He laces their fingers together and then, slowly but also too fast for Emma to stop him, pulls her closer. Their bodies are touching, and Emma lifts her eyes to meet his. The way he’s looking at her makes her feel like she’s on a boat, seasick almost. He reaches up with his hook and brushes a strand of hair off her face, and she holds her breath. She should take a step back.

She doesn’t.

The first touch of Killian’s lips is just a whisper, a question, and her answer should be no. But instead, she presses herself forward, against his body, the kiss deepening slowly, spreading warmth through her body. He drops her hand to tangle his fingers in her hair and she grabs the collar of his jacket, melting into him, opening her mouth under his.

This isn’t anything like she imagined, least of all because there’s a plastic hook digging into her back. She couldn’t have imagined the taste of alcohol on his lips, the smell of smoke and his cologne mingling together, the way his body feels warmand safe even though she’s terrified. His tongue slides against hers, soft and slow, and she almost _moans_ , her body thrumming with wanting.

And then, suddenly, drunk or not, everything hits her. She steps back, pushing him gently so he’s pressed against the pole again, and squeezes her eyes shut, like she can just wish this all away.

“Emma,” he breathes, but she can’t look at him. She won’t be able to walk away if she does.

“Goodnight.” She turns on her heel and walks home, head painfully clear, hands shaking. She doesn’t stop when he calls after her again.

—-

Emma sleeps terribly, fitfully, room spinning from alcohol, stomach churning with shame. The sun is starting to rise by the time she finally is able to fall asleep for real, so it’s quite a bit after noon before she walks up again. She feels dehydrated and hollowed out.

She lies in bed without moving for as long as possible before reaching for the half-drunk Gatorade bottle on her nightstand and chugging the rest. Her phone is lit up, and she grabs it, taking a deep breath before reading the messages.

The first is from Regina, just a huge set of photos taken during the night. Emma doesn’t remember most of them, but they all look so happy.

The second is from Killian, and Emma doesn’t want to read it. She doesn’t want to read his apologies or blame or whatever else he’s going to try to say to make them both feel better. But she can’t ignore him forever, so she opens it.

_I’m in absolute tatters today. Hope you’re feeling less delicate than I. Text me when you’re awake and I can bring you a massive coffee xx_

So apparently they’re pretending it didn’t happen. Okay. Emma can do that.

_Slept till 1 but I feel okay. If the coffee isn’t from Granny’s, I’m not interested._

_I would never disappoint you. Would you fancy a pastry too?_

_How could I ever say no to that???_

_See you soon._

Emma quickly calculates how long it takes Killian to get to Granny’s, how long the wait for coffee is on a Sunday, and figures she has time for a shower. She smells like stale beer and weed and has fake blood all over her neck, and usually she doesn’t really care what she looks like around Killian, but she just really wants to look like she has her shit together for once. Like a stupid drunken kiss didn’t ruin her entire night.

She’s blow-drying her hair when her mom yells up the stairs that Killian is here, and then she hears footsteps. She stares at herself in the bathroom mirror while she waits, her hair half-dry, makeup free and in sweats, and deems it acceptable. This is a completely normal way to look for hungover coffee with your best friend.

Killian hits the top of the stairs at the same time she opens the bathroom door, and they both freeze, face-to-face. Killian is dressed, but there’s a softness to him, too, whether it’s from the worn sweatshirt he’s wearing, or his tired eyes, still rimmed in the last remnants of eyeliner from the night before. He doesn’t look quite as normal as he was acting through text.

She leads him back into her room, closing the door halfway behind him in accordance with the house rules. She sits in her window seat, holding out her hands for the coffee, and Killian smiles and hands it over. He grabs her desk chair, pulling it close enough that their knees almost touch when he sits down, and Emma looks down, focusing on the warm cup in her hand. She counts her breaths, in and out, hoping words will come.

And then Killian puts his hand on her knee.

She looks up, meeting his eyes, and for the first time in their friendship, she can’t read what she sees there. “I can’t stop thinking about last night,” Killian says so softly, like every word is delicate. Maybe it is.

“Killian. We can’t.” Emma tries to make her voice firm, but Killian looks so tentative, so scared. “It was a mistake.”

“I know, I know.” He reaches up, traces her cheekbone with the pad of his thumb, and she shivers. “But I don’t regret it.”

Emma lets herself lean into his touch then, just for a moment, eyes fluttering closed. “Me neither,” she whispers, and they stay like that, not moving, Killian’s hand soft and warm against her cheek, for as long as possible.

Then they drink their coffees and eat their croissants and go through the pictures Regina sent like everything is just the way it was twenty-four hours ago. And maybe their fingers brush a little more than usual, maybe Emma feels hot all over when their eyes meet, but she can handle it. This is fine.

—-

Emma doesn’t give Killian a ride to school on Monday and Tuesday, which happens sometimes. Killian is always running late, and sometimes she just can’t wait for him, or she has a dentist appointment, or her mom’s car dies and she needs to give her a ride to work. Or maybe she just doesn’t want to be trapped in a tiny car with him for fifteen minutes.

Things can’t go from “making out against a streetlight” to “totally normal best friends” in forty-eight hours.

On Wednesday, when she walks out the front door, Killian is leaning against the hood of her car, arms crossed, eyebrow raised.

“You’re up early,” she mumbles, moving around him and the car to unlock her door. “I guess I can give you a ride.”

“What a gentleman you are, Swan,” Killian says, sliding in the passenger seat. “Seems the universe is trying to take our quiet mornings away from us, or you’ve been avoiding me.”

Emma laughs, pulling out of her driveway. “I’m not sure quiet mornings exist for you.”

“I could do a quiet morning. Breakfast in bed, make you some pancakes.” Emma glances over at him out of the corner of her eye, and he just looks so raw and honest, like he really wants to do that for her. Emma hates that.

“Killian, please,” she groans. “We can’t.”

“I know we can’t do anything, Emma. I just want to enjoy everything we can.” He reaches over, across the car, and takes her hand from where it was resting on her leg. He twines their fingers together, palms pressed tight, the cool metal of the rings he always wears making her shiver.

They hold hands while she drives, talking about homework and the gossip around the Halloween party and the little high school things, the dumb stuff that Emma never cares about. She lets go of his hand to make the last turn into the parking lot, and the smile he flashes her is tinged with sadness.

—-

Emma has always been good at compartmentalizing her life. It’s a skill you have to learn in the foster system, or every broken home will break you, too. So for as long as she can remember, she’s taken the bad things and put them in a little safe and pushed that safe as far back into her emotional closet as possible. Every once in a while, things spill out, and she’s crying about something that happened when she was six, but usually, it works.

She now feels like someone took that safe out of her closet and put it on her bed and now she has to look at it every damn day.

Regina asks her why she’s being so distant lately, and she makes up a pretty terrible lie about her grandfather being sick. Neal tells her he loves her, that he can’t wait to see her at thanksgiving, and she says the same back like she’s reading a script. Miss Blanchard asks her why all her essays have been a day late for the last two weeks and she mumbles something about college applications. Killian traces the lines on her palm while she drives, and she has to bite her lip to keep from screaming.

“Ten more days,” Neal says on the phone, their semi-weekly Sunday calls still a tradition, even though they’re busier. For a second, Emma has no idea what he’s talking about. “Thanksgiving,” he clarifies.

“Oh, yeah, of course. Are you so excited for my mom’s sweet potatoes?”Neal laughs and agrees, and then starts complaining about his dad. Emma lets him talk, only half-listening. She knows their relationship is complicated, but Emma is pretty sure that even if her biological parents had been terrible, she would’ve just been grateful that they didn’t give her up. She met kids in foster care whose dads abandoned them when their mom left. Maybe Neal should try being grateful that his shitty dad still loves him.

There’s a soft knock at her door and Killian sticks his head in, holding his books. She completely forgot that she had agreed to help him study for their microbiology test. “I have to go, Neal,” she interrupts him. “I have to study so I don’t fail my senior year and then never get to come join you in New York.”

“You’re gonna kick ass, Emma,” Neal says, and she smiles. “I love you. See you soon.”

“You too.”

She hangs up and tosses her phone onto her vanity, looking up to see Killian still waiting in the doorway. “How did you get up here without my parents bothering you about it?”

“Oh they did, but you know I’m good with parents.” He smirks, and takes a step into her room. “Your mum isn’t here and your dad is watching football, so no one really cared much where I went.”

Emma pats the bed next to her. “Come on in, Jones, we’ve got a test to pass.” She hops off the bed at the same time he’s walking over to it, grabbing her textbook off the desk. Killian kicks his boots off and shrugs out of his jacket, leaving both in a heap on the floor, before sitting down, notebook in front of him. Emma pauses before joining him and makes sure they’re separated by as many books and notebooks as possible.

They’ve studied together a million times, just like this, in her bedroom with the door cracked, books spread across her mattress. Eight years, countless tests, platonic best friends in her childhood bedroom, and Emma is determined to have that be what this is.

“Well, don’t think I’ve learned a single thing all year,” Killian says after a few minutes, throwing his pen down on the bed. “In one ear, out the other, I suppose.”

Emma laughs and throws her pen at him, where it bounces solidly off his chest. “You passed the last test, so you’ve gotta know something.” 

“Nope.” Killian taps his forehead. “It’s all empty up here.”

Emma shakes her head, turning back to start highlighting vocabulary words in her notebook, but she can feel Killian’s eyes on her. Without looking up, she asks, “what do you want?”

“Thought we could take a study break.” Emma looks up at him, then, and his eyes are twinkling, mischievous. “It’s good for our brains, I hear.”

“Killian,” she exhales. “We’ve been so good, we can’t screw it up. If we just keep ignoring it, it’s going to go away. I thought that’s what we agreed on.”

“We actually didn’t agree on anything because we’ve never talked about it, love. Don’t get confused with the conversations you’ve had in your head.” Killian’s voice is cautious but firm, and Emma doesn’t like it. Especially considering he’s absolutely right.

“We don’t want to hurt anyone, though.” She looks down at her hands, turning the highlighter around and around between her fingers. It’s not like her to feel so powerless, and she hates it. She’s used to being tough and strong and maybe a little cold, but this is so different. She feels like she’s none of those things anymore.

“No one has to get hurt,” he whispers, slowly reaching across the distance between them to cup her cheek. He sounds so sure of himself, the strong Killian who has always been there for her, and she lets herself believe him. She’s lost so many things in her life. She can’t lose him too, not when he’s all she wants.

She reaches up to touch his hand on her cheek, and the next thing she knows, the books are flying off the bed as Killian closes the gap between them, mouth crashing against hers.

This kiss is slower than the first, with no alcohol to dull the edges. She can feel his stubble, how soft his lips are, the roughness of his hand as it moves from her cheek to the back of her neck, pulling her impossibly closer. She lets out a breath against his mouth, and feels him smile in response.

She reaches her hands up to tug on his shirt, making him crawl up the bed, closer to her, until she’s leaning back against her pillows and his body is over hers. Her brain quiets, just focusing on this, on Killian’s hands and mouth and tongue. She hooks her ankle around his calf, trying to draw him closer, wanting to feel everything and think of nothing.

Emma lets her mind clear, lets everything melt away under Killian’s mouth. Everything is so quiet. So still. So delicate.

He slips his hand under her sweatshirt, warm hand sliding up her stomach to wrap around her ribs, leaving flames in its wake. She’s never felt like this, like a live wire, humming. She doesn’t want it to stop.

But everything does, everything has to. She hears her mom yelling her name up the stairs like it’s through water, far away, taking a moment to make sense. “Shit,” she hisses, tearing her mouth away from Killian’s and quickly sliding up on the bed until her back hits the wall.

They’re both sitting on opposite ends of the bed, notebooks open on their laps, by the time her mom knocks on the door and pokes her head inside. “Killian, are you staying for dinner?”

“No, um.” He swallows, runs his fingers through his hair. “I should go home.”

“Yeah, we’ve studied everything important,” Emma agrees when Killian stands. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“We’ll review in the morning,” Killian says, turning as he reaches the door. He winks at her before walking out, and Emma blushes, hot to the tip of her ears.

—-

They miss homeroom the next morning.

Emma pulls into the movie theater parking lot, parking at the back even thought the entirety of the parking lot is empty. It’s a small movie theater, two screens, that doesn’t open until the afternoon matinees during the week. The parking lot is quiet, still bathed in the hazy early morning light, hidden from the sidewalks by buildings.

They make out in the backseat for a few minutes, and then just settle together, Killian propped up against the door, Emma between his legs with her back against his chest, his arms around her, their fingers tangled together.

Emma isn’t usually great with silence, feeling uncomfortable and twitchy when it goes on too long, but that’s never been a problem with Killian. It’s nice to just sit here quietly, cut off from the rest of the world for a little while.

“You should apply to a school in LA with me,” he says, and presses a kiss to the top of her head.

“You’re going to LA?” Emma asks, turning as much as possible to look up at him. “I thought you were going back to England?”

“That was just a plan to get away from my father, but after spending the summer there, it wasn’t quite what I remembered.”

“What about Milah?”

Killian laughs a little. “She’s lovely, but it’s not going anywhere.” He kisses Emma’s ear, making her tremble. “I need to be near the water. California has a lot of water.”

“There’s water everywhere, and a lot of that water is closer to New York.”

Killian sighs. “Living in New York was never my dream, love. That’s you and your Neal.”

They’re quiet for a minute, but this quiet is heavier, sadder. Emma brings their hands to her mouth, kissing his knuckles. “I’ll miss you so much.”

“Then come with me,” he whispers. He moves her hair from the back of her neck and peppers kisses everywhere. Her eyes fall closed and she lets out a long sigh. “Just apply with me.”

“This isn’t fair, you’re manipulating me with your kisses.” She sits up, turning around to face him, kneeling on the seat. His eyes are bright, lips still pink from kissing, and Emma reaches out and runs her knuckles against the stubble on his cheek. “I can’t make any promises, but I’ll apply.”

Killian grins and swoops forward, kissing her so hard she loses her balance, his hands flying to her hips the only thing keeping her upright.

—-

Emma somehow gets conned into helping Regina put up posters for the winter formal Friday after school, which is not fair on so many levels. First of all, Regina has a student council to boss around and make put up posters, and after that, she has a boyfriend. Second of all, the dance is four days before Neal gets home for Christmas break, so Emma doesn’t even have a date. It’s not fair.

“Don’t you have minions to do this work for you?” Emma asks, leaning against the wall outside the chemistry labs while Regina makes sure the poster is perfectly centered and straight on the bulletin board. She actually moved a poster about an MIT Open House to find the perfect location.

“I do,” Regina agrees. She holds out her hand for thumbtacks, and Emma drops four into her palm. “But I feel like we haven’t hung out much since the Halloween party and I wanted to change that.”

“I’m not sure this,” Emma gestures to them, and then the empty school hallway, “counts as hanging out. Couldn’t you just invite me over for a sleepover or something?”

“I don’t like people sleeping at my house.” Regina shrugs and turns on her heel, walking down the hall to the next bulletin board. “And you can be a bit like a wounded animal. I wouldn’t want you to get spooked and be trapped inside.”

Emma rolls her eyes. “I’m not a wounded animal.”

“You absolutely are, but it’s part of your charm.” Regina flashes a smile that doesn’t reach her eyes, and Emma sighs, handing her more thumbtacks. “What’s new with you? I noticed you had this weird slump after Halloween, you’re normal now, right?”

“I am blown away by the tact with which you just asked me if I’m okay,” Emma groans. “I’m fine, just the family stuff I mentioned.”

Regina concentrates on the poster for a minute and then turns to Emma, head tilted. “I’m not saying I don’t believe your grandfather was sick or whatever it was, I just think there’s more. I might be a cold-hearted bitch, but if I decide I like someone, they can trust me. You can trust me.”

“It’s not about trust,” Emma says simply, and starts heading towards the cafeteria and more places for posters. They hang a few more in silence, which Emma appreciates, but that can only last so long with Regina.

“I’ve noticed you and Jones are a lot less....yearning lately. Have you finally moved on?”

“We never yearned, Regina, stop. I have a boyfriend.”

Regina turns and leans against the wall, arms crossed in front of her. “This room is a judgment free zone.” A pause, and then, “are you and Killian fucking?”

Emma drops the thumbtacks.

“No, what? No. Definitely not. We’re just friends.” Emma can’t even hear the words she’s saying, just a lot of no, a lot of head shaking and hand waving and Regina just looks at her steadily. She can hear her heart pounding in her ears. “Why would you think that?”

“Less yearning, more touching. It’s really not hard to figure it out.” Regina looks at her a little sadly. “I hope whatever it is, it all ends well. Just be careful around Neal. He isn’t stupid.”

They hang the last of the posters in silence, Emma feeling sick. She knows her silence is confirmation for Regina, but she doesn’t have anything to say. And maybe part of her wants to have one person in her life who knows the truth, for when this all ends as badly as she’s always known it would.

—-

After Regina’s comments and a Saturday afternoon make out session in her bedroom that got so out of hand that Killian somehow forgot one sock and his black undershirt on her bedroom floor, Emma decides they need to cool it. She doesn’t tell Killian that, just makes up excuses to not be able to bring him to or from school, like a mature adult. There’s only two and a half days before Thanksgiving, before she sees Neal, and she knows that seeing him will fix everything.

Class ends at noon on Wednesday, but Emma says she has to finish an art project before break - which is mostly true. Killian says he can wait, but Emma tells him to get a ride home with someone else. He almost pouts, and she almost takes it all back, and then she reminds herself that Neal is probably packing his suitcase to come home right now, and she leaves Killian standing at her locker, puppy dog eyes and all.

She spends almost an hour in the art room, putting the final touches on her painting, and it’s actually kind of good. Not artist level, but at least a B, and it got her mind off everything for a little while.

She left her jacket in her locker, and the sky is threatening rain, so she has to run up two flights of stairs to get it. It’s really unfair that the seniors are upstairs, as if they haven’t earned the right to never climb a flight again.

Killian is on the stairs when she opens the door, walking towards her. He smiles, and Emma can’t help but return it. “I had some things to do, so I waited for you.”

“Were you lurking in this stairwell the whole time?” She tries to sound annoyed but it comes out more fond.

“I was coming to meet you outside the art room, but you were faster than I predicted.”

Emma start climbing the stairs towards him, and gives him a gentle push when she reaches him. “Go back up, I need my jacket.”

“You can borrow mine,” he offers, starting to take it off for her, but she stops him.

“I already have that t-shirt and your Halloween jewelry, I don’t need a Killian collection.” She takes his hand and walks upstairs, making him follow.

“Am I ever getting that shirt back? It’s quite a good shirt.”

Emma laughs. “I’m washing it, okay?” It’s only a half-lie: she will definitely wash it when she’s done wearing it to bed.

“I appreciate that, love.”

When they reach the top of the stairs, Killian stops her before she can open the door, drawing her closer. “What?” She asks, pulling her hand away.

“I’ve never made out with anyone at school,” he says, raising an eyebrow, doing that insufferable thing where he looks up at her like he’s completely irresistible. Which he kind of is. “This seems like a perfect opportunity.”

“You’re such an idiot,” she says, but she’s moving closer to him, letting him pull her back in. “Five minutes.” He nods, and then spins them around so he can press her against the wall. Their mouths find each other easily now, and yeah, he was right. This is pretty hot.

Killian’s lips move from her mouth, along her jaw, down her neck, and she has to grab onto him to keep from making a sound, biting her lip, fingers twisted in the soft leather of his jacket.

“You know what,” she gasps, as his teeth gently graze her collarbone. “I was right here when I realized I liked you.”

Killian freezes and looks up at her. “When you what?”

“Oh shit,” Emma falters. “I didn’t mean to say that. You’ve got me all messed up.”

“I didn’t know you liked me. Like, fancied me?” Emma can’t read his expression, which is scary, but at least he’s still close, body pressed against her, one hand in her hair.

“Well,” she swallows. “Yeah. Why else would I be doing this?”

He makes this weird, strangled noise in his throat, and then dives back in to kiss her. It’s more insistent this time, their tongues almost dueling, his hand dropping to her waist to pull her hard against him.They kiss until she’s breathless, until she has to pull away to breathe, gasping and flushed. She lets her head fall onto his shoulder and laughs weakly.

He presses a soft kiss to her temple. “I like you too,” he whispers, barely loud enough for her to hear.

They stay like that for a long minute, his arms around her, bodies almost swaying as if in storm. She feels safe, like nothing outside matters. She wishes that was true.

—-

Emma’s house is loud on Thanksgiving, which is unusual. Usually just her grandparents are there, and then Neal comes over for pie, but this year, her mom’s sister came too, with her daughters and husband and it’s just a little louder than Emma prefers. She tries to stay up in her room for as long as possible, but her cousins are twelve and fifteen and they _need_ to hang out with her, apparently.

They mostly just end up playing Mario Kart until dinner is ready, Anna and Elsa fighting for first while Emma happily takes eighth in almost every race. She’s never been great at video games.

Neal rings the doorbell while they’re clearing off the table to make room for dessert, and Emma practically flies from the kitchen to his arms in the blink of an eye. He’s laughing, hugging her tight, and she peppers kisses all over his face until he stops her, hands on her cheeks, to softly press his lips against hers. It’s very family-friendly, sweet, and Emma gets butterflies.

Her mom loves Neal, always has, so she’s maybe even more excited to see him than Emma, hugging him and offering him a slice of every kind of pie in the universe. Emma watches, smiling, as he introduces himself to her cousins and aunt and uncle, even though he met them a few Christmases ago. He’s so good at being a gentleman when the situation calls for it.

After pie and coffee and socializing in the living room, darkness is falling and the family time is coming to an end. Emma takes Neal’s hand and drags him upstairs, rolling her eyes at her mom’s reminder to leave the door open.

Neal drops down into her desk chair as soon as he gets in the room, while Emma carefully closes the door just enough to technically be open, but still give them privacy. “Man, I missed this place.”

“My room specifically?” She asks, wandering over to sit down on the bed.

“This terrible town, family dinners, your room.” He smiles softly at her. “You, specifically.” He leans forward in the chair, bumping his noise against hers and then kissing her, a real kiss.

When Emma pulls back, opening her eyes, she’s suddenly painfully aware of all the weird things out of place in her room. Killian’s skull necklace is hanging from her vanity mirror, surrounded by taped up photos of the group of them at the party. There are two coffee cups from Granny’s on her desk, one with her faint lipstick mark, one without. His t-shirt is half-underneath her pillow, half totally exposed, inches from her leg.

She grabs the front of Neal’s shirt and pulls him, hard, out of the chair and on top of her, her body covering the shirt, hoping her kisses make him unable to notice anything. Maybe it’s not even that obvious. Maybe she only sees it all because she knows what it means.

They kiss and talk and kiss and talk, Neal telling her about college and his dad, Emma telling him about school and college applications. She doesn’t mention that she’s applying to USC too, but it’s not like that matters. She’s not going.

“I’m so mad you’re coming home for Christmas after the winter formal,” she says, pouting.

Neal is propped up on his elbow in bed, looking down at her, and he sticks out his bottom lip in a mocking pout, making her laugh. “I’m sure you have friends without dates?” She shakes her head. “Killian?”

“I can’t go to a dance with Killian,” she chokes out after a second of pure white noise in her brain.

“You definitely can. He can probably pretend to be a gentleman for one night.”

Emma can’t believe these words are coming out of her boyfriend’s mouth. Did he just give her permission to cheat on him? No. He thinks obviously nothing would happen. Emma and Killian, platonic best friends forever, who can totally go to a formal dance together and have it not be weird.

And if she says no, doesn’t that make it seem like they’re not totally platonic best friends? Emma feels paranoid and crazy and all she can think of to say is, “that sounds fun.”

“Problem solved,” Neal says, triumphantly, and kisses her again.

Problem created.

—- 

They get the whole group together for a dinner at Granny’s before anyone has to head back to college. Eight of them piled into the biggest booth, more people they know scattered around the diner, as if this was the pre-arranged hang out spot on Thanksgiving weekend. Everyone is loud and Granny retreats into the back, leaving Ruby in charge.

Emma sits in the booth, Neal’s arm around her shoulders, eating French fries and basking in the happy glow of all her friends together. This is nice. This is normal.

Killian has pulled up a chair, too many people already shoved in the booth, and he’s a safe, appropriate distance from Emma. She forces herself not to look at him unless he’s talking, focusing on her food or Neal, and it gets easier every minute.

Peter is telling some insane story about a secret society at Yale and his plans to take it over, and everyone is laughing, and Killian’s knee bumps into Emma’s. She drops her fry, feeling like she just got hit by a bolt of lightning. This is ridiculous.

The door to Granny’s opens then, before she can fully meltdown, and she looks up to see August walking in. She jumps up from her seat, squeezing past Killian, and launches herself into August’s arms. He laughs, patting her back and ruffling her hair, always the big brother she never had.

“What are you doing here? I didn’t know you were in town,” Emma accuses, hands on her hips.

“I was trying to surprise my dad, but then my plane got delayed and I didn’t get in until Friday morning.” He shrugs. “He was very surprised.”

“That makes two of us, mate,” Killian says, suddenly next to Emma. He shakes August’s hand, and August looks impressed, more used to Killian being snarky around him than nice. “Good to see you again.”

“Yeah, thanks,” he says, raising an eyebrow in Emma’s direction. “Is there room for me at this booth?”

They make room, pulling up another chair. Emma makes Killian get in the booth next to Neal so she can sit next to August and ask him a million questions about the midwest. August really knows how to captivate an audience, and maybe he does it with some exaggeration or white lies, but it makes for a great story.

Eventually, Granny comes out and tells them they can’t just drink hot chocolate and take over a table all night. Groaning, they all make their way out, Neal grabbing Emma’s hand. He tucks her against him, pressing a kiss to her temple, making her smile.

“My dad is working late tonight if you want to come over,” he says, too loud, and Emma’s face gets hot.

“I actually think,” she steps away from him, moving closer to August, “I’m gonna hang out with August for a bit.”

“You are?” August asks, and Emma shoves him towards his motorcycle. “Maybe August is busy!”

“August is never too busy for his best friend in the whole world.” They’re laughing and August hands her his extra helmet and Emma focuses on putting it on, not meeting Neal’s eyes. She can’t handle whatever expression is there, confusion or hurt or anything.

When she turns from the motorcycle, Neal is there, a soft, sad smile on his face. “I wish we could be together but I’ll be back soon.” He reaches up to cup her cheek, and Emma smiles back at him. “I’ll come over to say goodbye in the morning, okay?”

“Please do.” He kisses her, soft and slow and sweet, and for a second, she almost changes her mind. But then he’s gone, off to do something stupid with Peter, and it’s too late.

“See you Monday, Swan,” Killian says, reaching out to squeeze her shoulder. It burns through two layers of fabric.

“Where do you want to go?” August asks from astride his bike.

“Anywhere.”

August drives around the sleepy streets for a while and then heads out of town a bit, towards the forest. He has this weird old wishing well he likes for some reason, something he discovered when he was first adopted, and it’s still sort of his comfort place in town. Emma needs the comfort.

“Can I tell you something and you promise not to judge me?” Emma asks, leaning against the well, looking over the edge at the water deep down there.

“Of course, Emma. After everything we've been through, I could never judge you, for anything.”

“I’m sort of, like.” She pauses, tosses a rock in the well. “Cheating on Neal? With Killian?”

August is silent for a long moment. “Is that a question?”

“No, it’s a thing I’m definitely doing.”

He look at her, hard, and Emma wants to look away. “Why?”

“I wish I knew.” She lets her head fall into her hands and with it, the weight of the last month. She can’t believe it’s only been a month. It feels like she’s been carrying this burden forever. “We were drunk and kissed on Halloween, which could’ve just been a mistake, but we just keep doing it. I really like him. I’m so happy when I’m with him, and then I remember what we’re doing and I just hate myself so much.”

“Hey,” August interrupts, stepping closer so he can wrap an arm around her. “Don’t ever hate yourself.” Emma laughs weakly, shaking her head. It’s not that easy. “You’re young, shit happens. You just need to figure out what you’re okay with doing, who you’re okay with hurting.”

“I don’t want to hurt anyone, though.” She lifts her head to wave her hands like she’s casting a magical spell. “Can’t I just magically make everything work out?”

August looks like he’s thinking for a second, and then shakes his head. “I think you’re eventually going to have to make a choice, and the longer you wait, the harder it’s gonna be.”

“I hate when you’re right.”

They stay out a little bit longer, until it’s too dark to see anything, and August brings her home. She feels a bit better, considering everything, considering she still has no idea what she’s going to do. It just feels good to be totally honest with someone about the worst thing she’s ever done and have them still love her afterwards.

—-

Emma’s doorbell rings at exactly 7:35, as she’s putting on her shoes and completely unable to find her backpack. Her dad already left for work and her mom is in the shower, so she answers the door herself, expecting UPS or something.

Killian has his arms around her before she can even process that he’s the one on the other side of the door, his hands sliding up the back of her shirt, pressing hot against her skin. “God, I missed touching you,” he breathes into her hair, and Emma feels dizzy.

“Wait, stop,” she gasps, and Killian does, taking a small step back. The way he’s looking at her, like he really, truly missed her after just a few days, makes her want to _cry_. “One, I need to find my backpack. Two, my mom could literally come downstairs any second.”

Killian steps in the house, looking for her backpack while she laces her boots, finding it behind a chair in the living room. She gives him a kiss on the cheek as a thank you, and she’s pretty sure he blushes.

Once they pull out of the driveway, Emma lets out a long sigh and Killian pauses in reaching for her hand to give her a quizzical look. “There’s a few things we need to talk about.”

“Talking about things? I wasn’t sure you knew how to do that, Swan.”

Emma rolls her eyes. “So I sorta told August about us. He was cool about it, but I just wanted to let you know he knows. And I think Regina has figured it out, too.”

“Well I guess next is our big parade,” he says dryly.

“I’m ignoring you,” she says simply. “Okay the next thing is weird and don’t be afraid to say no.” Killian looks over at her, eyebrows knitted together, and Emma takes a deep breath before speaking, all in a rush. “I was complaining to Neal about the winter formal and not having anyone to go with and he said we should go together so do you want to do that?”

“Are you asking me on a date?”

Emma reaches over to slap his thigh, hard, and Killian just laughs and takes her hand. “Is that a no?” She asks.

“That’s a yes.”

She glances over at him at a stop sign and smiles, and he smiles back, and they just sit there like that for too long, until the car behind them honks and Emma has to pay attention to the road again.

—-

“I’m getting a limo for the formal if anyone wants to join us,” Regina announces at lunch, as if the dance isn’t still almost two weeks away.

“I don’t even have a dress and Regina is already getting a limo,” Ruby mumbles just loud enough for Emma to hear, and they both laugh.

“Never said no to a limo in my life,” Will replies, looking pleased with himself while Belle just shakes her head. “Come to think of it, never said yes to one either.”

“Should we join them?” Emma asks Killian, raising her eyebrows at him across the table.

Killian winces. “I’m not really a big joiner, Swan.”

Emma kicks him under the table. “Come on, let’s be fancy for one night, Jones.”

“Milah isn’t visiting in time for the dance?” Robin asks, and Killian’s face falls.

“Milah is coming here?” Emma tries to keep her voice light, and is pretty sure she’s succeeded. Only Killian’s expression makes it clear he knows there’s nothing light about her question.

“We’ve discussed it. For New Years maybe. Nothing’s set in stone though.”

“Great. I can’t wait to meet her.” Emma looks back down at her plate, stabbing her mac and cheese with her fork over and over again. She feels Regina’s hand fall gently on her wrist, and swallows, stilling her hand. Regina gives her a squeeze, a quick you’ll-be-okay touch, and Emma focuses on that.

She needs to stop acting like she gets to be jealous when Milah had him first.

—-

Emma manages to not say more than five words to Killian for over two days, beating some of her best records yet. But when she gets home from work Friday night, he’s sitting on her front steps, shivering even in his coat, and Emma can’t be mad at him. The poor guy is freezing to death for her.

“My mom’s out of town for the weekend so you can come in to talk,” she says, stepping around him to open the door. “My dad always forgets that boys aren’t allowed past nine, especially if there’s a sport on.”

Killian jumps to his feet and follows her inside, yelling a “hello, Mr. Swan,” into the living room, as they head upstairs. “I’m sorry,” he says before they even get to her room.

Emma turns to face him once she’s closed to door behind them. “You don’t need to apologize.”

“Yes, I do. You’ve been avoiding me, which means I did something wrong.” He steps towards her, reaching out to take both her hands. “Tell me what I did so I never do it again.”

She sighs, closing her eyes for a second. Centering herself. “It’s not my place. I just felt weird about Milah coming to visit you. Jealous, I guess.”

“Now you know how I felt over Thanksgiving break.”

“Are you saying you want me to feel like this? Like it’s fair or something?” She pulls her hands away from him, backing up a few steps and crossing her arms.

“No, Emma.” He takes a step forward. “I’m just saying this whole thing sucks. I wish it wasn’t like this.”

She exhales in a loud huff. “This really is all so dumb. Why didn’t we get drunk and kiss at a Halloween party _last_ year instead of this year?”

Killian’s eyebrow twitches up and he takes a step closer, almost close enough to touch. “You would’ve kissed me last year?”

“Well, it appears that drunk Emma has much lower standards than sober Emma, so probably. I mean, _eyeliner_? I must’ve lost my mind.”

Killian laughs and reaches for her, finally, pulling her close, fitting her tight against him. “I’m so glad you lost your mind.” He kisses her, long and slow, and Emma can’t believe she was ever jealous. She’s never been kissed like this, and she can’t imagine Killian has either, judging by the way his heart pounds, thudding against her own chest.

Their coats fall to the floor and Emma pushes him backwards, crowding against him, until his legs hit the end of her bed and he’s able to fall back onto it. She climbs on top of him, straddling his hips, and just looks down at him. “Let’s be honest with each other, always. Tell me the truth about Milah and I’ll tell you the truth about Neal, even if it hurts.”

“I don’t want to think about them right now,” Killian groans.

Emma splays her fingers across his chest, leaning over him. “Just promise me.”

He moves to kiss her, but Emma sits back up, waiting. “I promise.”

She smiles. “Good boy, here’s your reward.” She pulls her turtleneck over her head in one swift motion and Killian gasps, reaching for her immediately.

Emma loses track of time, completely lost in Killian. They kiss for what feels like hours, until they’re both shirtless, sweaty and twisted in her sheets. “I love this,” Killian manages through labored breaths, hand on Emma’s denim-covered thigh as she wraps her leg around him. “That’s me being honest. I never want to stop.”

Emma runs her fingers through his hair, looking at him. “We’re going to have to someday, we can’t keep doing this to them.”

Killian rests his forehead against hers. “There are other ways this can end.”

Emma feels like the wind is knocked out of her at that. She had never considered other options, because she can’t hurt Neal like that. But Killian saying it like that, so soft and sure of himself, like them being together for real is a possibility, or something he would even want, knocks her off her axis. She doesn’t even know what to say, so she just kisses him.

“May I?” Killian asks, fingers deftly undoing the button on her jeans. She nods and helps him, peeling the tight jeans off her legs. “Let me show you why you should pick me,” he whispers, and Emma manages to choke out a yes, maybe with a whimpered “please” that she would deny.

He slides down her body, hands and mouth everywhere, and Emma sees stars. She’s had orgasms before, sure, but never like this, never lighting her whole body on fire, every nerve on high alert, never having to bite her arm so she didn’t scream.

After, he kisses her, and then says he needs five minutes without touching. Emma laughs as he opens her bedroom window to stand in front of it. “I love that you can see my room from here.”

“If only I had a telescope.” Emma grabs Killian’s discarded vintage tee from the floor, pulling it on and carefully taking her bra off underneath it. She watches him silently, the moonlight glowing on his face, and then says his name. “Do you want to sleep over?”

Killian turns back around and smiles when he sees her in his shirt. “Since you’re stealing more of my clothes, I guess I don’t have a choice.” He crosses the room back to her, and his hands are cold when he touches her. “I’d love to sleep over.”

Emma finds him an oversized pair of her sweatpants that actually fit. She checks to make sure all the lights in the house are off, and they tip toe into the bathroom, Emma finding an unopened toothbrush for him at the back of the cabinet. They brush their teeth together, and Emma feels so domestic and grown up and she can’t stop smiling, even with a mouth full of toothpaste.

Her full size bed is big enough for both of them, but still small enough that they have to stay wrapped up in each other. She rests her head on his chest and he plays with her hair, humming some melody that sounds like a lullaby. “How does it feel to be the first boy to ever sleep in my bed?” She asks, lifting her head to look at him.

“I feel honored, Swan.” He kisses her on the forehead and then the mouth, keeping it chaste, sweet.

“Goodnight, Killian,” she whispers as she reaches across him to turn off the lamp.

“Goodnight, love.”

She falls asleep faster than she ever has before, Killian’s arms around her, the warmth of his body against hers, and dreams only good things.

——

The room is bright when Emma wakes up, morning sunshine streaming in the window. Killian’s arm is over her, his face half-hidden in the pillow, and Emma watches him, waiting for him to wake. She misses the moonlight and the darkness. Everything feels so much harsher in the morning.

Eventually, when she’s bored of waiting, Emma presses a kiss to his eyebrow, his forehead, his cheek, until he wakes up, smiling. He pulls her closer with the arm that’s already around her, kissing her hard. “Morning,” he says, voice heavy with sleep.

“You want to sneak out the window?” She asks after a few moments of slow, lazy kisses. “Or just run out the front door and hope my dad doesn’t see you?”

“I’m sure we could just make up a story. We’re quite subtle with our affection for each other, he won’t suspect a thing.” She rolls on top of him and looks down at him, smirking. “Do you think we’re obvious, love?”

“A bit,” she says, and kisses him again. His hands slide up her bare thighs, and she sits up quickly, stopping him. “After the formal, we have to stop this for a while, okay? While Neal is back. We can figure out what to do after that.”

Killian runs circles on her thighs with the pad of his thumb, almost absentmindedly. He makes a face at her words. “I don’t want to stop.”

“Well, some of us don’t want to have my boyfriend walk in us in bed together, Killian.” She sighs, reaching for his hands to tangle their fingers together. “I’m with him because I care about him. I don’t know how you feel about Milah, but I love Neal, and this doesn’t change that.”

Killian doesn’t respond for a long time, just looks up at her, and Emma holds her breath. “I appreciate the honesty,” he says softly, finally. “I should go.”

She crawls off of him, kneeling on the bed while he gets up and starts looking for his clothes. “You’re mad at me.”

He sighs. “I’m mad at me, Swan. I shouldn’t have let any of this happen.”

She watches him put his jeans back on, and she wants to say something, to fix it. But she can’t, because this is the truth. They shouldn’t have let any of this happen. She feels like she might cry, and she takes a few quick breaths, trying to steady herself.

“Emma.” Killian is touching her now, hands on her shoulders, and she looks up at him. He looks so worried that she forces a smile, even though she feels shaky. “I’m happy it all happened though, okay? I swear to that.”

“You’re still gonna take me to the dance, right? I already bought a dress.”

He smiles down at her, lifting his hand to her cheek. “It would be my honor.” He bows a little, making Emma laugh, and then kisses her, quick and chaste and making her want more, making her want him to crawl back in bed and never leave.

“I’m keeping your shirt, by the way,” Emma announces, but hops off the bed to walk over to her drawers. She pulls the one from a few weeks ago out, laundered and folded, and tosses it at his head. “You can wear this one. We’ll start an exchange system.”

Killian tugs the shirt over his head and then strides across the room to kiss her again. “You can keep this one as long as you like.”

He sneaks out the back while her dad is mowing in the front, and Emma watches him cross the backyard, hopping over the fence to his. He turns back, then, looking up at her window, and waves, like he used to do when they were kids and he had to hurry home for dinner. Emma’s heart aches at the memory. There’s so much history there. So much to lose.

—-

Emma has never been much of a formal dress kind of girl. Or a dress kind of girl at all. She got all dolled up for two proms last year - hers _and_ Neal’s - but she had promised herself that would be it for a full year.

But here she is, 7pm on a Saturday night, fixing her hair in front of a mirror and worrying that her dress is stupid and ugly. Despite the name, it’s only a semi-formal dance, but her light pink dress doesn’t feel like enough. Or maybe it’s too much.

Or maybe she’s having a meltdown over her dress to distract herself from everything else.

She’s fixing her ponytail for the fifth time when the doorbell rings. Killian said he’d be there before Regina was picking them up in her limo at 7:30, so she should’ve expected him. He’s never late.

Emma can hear her parents answering the door and groans. She remembers how many questions they asked Neal before prom, and knows Killian will be getting even more. Her heels take too long to put on and she’s frustrated by the time she makes it to the staircase, wishing they had left five minutes ago.

Killian is standing at the bottom of the stairs. He looks up when he hears her and smiles the biggest, stupidest smile Emma has ever seen on his face. She can’t quite focus on walking, just stands and stares at him, drinking in black slacks, black button-up, black tie, the all-black ensemble topped off with his leather jacket. He’s holding a small corsage, a single red rose on a wristlet, and it’s so unexpectedly sweet that Emma is convinced she’s dreaming all of this for half a second.

“Come down and let us take pictures,” her mom calls upstairs, snapping her out of it.

Killian reaches out his hand towards her, and Emma carefully walks towards him, slightly unsteady in her heels down the stairs. “You look…” he trails off, taking her hand, and Emma blushes. He hands her the corsage. “This is for you.”

“I figured,” she says, opening the plastic container holding it. “I think you’re supposed to put it on me, though, isn’t that the noble thing to do?”

Killian smirks, and Emma can hear the words he can’t say in front of her parents. He takes the corsage back and she holds out her left wrist. He slides it on, fingers grazing the inside of her palm, wrist, forearm, making her shiver. It looks perfect.

They pose for pictures in front of the Christmas tree, her mom telling horribly embarrassing jokes like, “this can be your Christmas card when you get married.” It’s practically torture. Killian’s hand is firm on her waist through it all, and every time she looks at him, she can’t help but smile.

Less than two months ago, they were standing in her front hall getting their pictures taken before another party, with no idea what was about to happen. So much can change so quickly.

Eventually, her parents let them go, and they make it outside before the limo arrives. Emma grabs her jacket too, her warm black leather one instead of her usual red, and it’s funny how much they match. She nudges him with her elbow as they stand at the bottom of her driveway, waiting. “We really look like a couple in our matching jackets tonight.”

Killian smiles at her and takes a step closer. “I think we are a couple. At least for tonight.”

Emma wants to kiss him, ignoring that her parents are probably watching from the windows, wants to step right into that fantasy world and live in it for the night. But headlights are on their faces suddenly, blinding her, pulling her back. The limo.

She climbs in the car, Killian right behind her, and settles next to Regina. The limo isn’t huge, or full of bottles of champagne and a flat screen television or anything, but it’s still probably the nicest thing Emma has ever touched in her life.

There’s only six of them in the back, Regina and Robin, Belle and Will, and her and Killian, which is just about the number of people Emma can handle being trapped in a car with. Regina, in a floor length blue velvet dress that almost looks too luxurious to ever actually be worn, passes out glasses of champagne, and raises hers in a toast.

“To our last winter formal of our high school careers,” she says, and everyone takes a sip.

The dance has just barely started by the time they pull up at the high school - Regina insists she needs to be there early because she’s Class President, but Emma is pretty sure she just likes to be early. Emma drags her feet, literally, through all the annoying check-in processes, showing her school ID, proving she’s not drunk, handing over her tickets.

There’s a photo station too, which she hates, pulling Neal away from it at _both_ proms, but Killian makes that stupid face she can’t resist and she’s letting him drag her into the room, unable to even protest. More photos, this time with a cheesy wintry backdrop and professional cameras. It’s all very cheesy, very 80’s romcom, but Killian makes it fun, whispering nonsense in her ear until she laughs.

Inside the gym, the winter wonderland decorations continue. The DJ is playing top 40, but no one is really dancing yet. There are tables and chairs on one side of the room, mostly claimed by seniors, so Emma leads Killian over there, where their friends have already claimed a table.

“We all look so hot tonight,” Ruby says excitedly when they sit down. “Like, look at us. We might not be the popular kids, but we’re definitely the cool kids.”

Emma laughs. “I don’t feel very cool wobbling around in heels.”

“You’re the coolest, Swan,” Killian assures her, and takes her hand under the table, hidden from view.

The music gets better as the night goes on, and they all make their way out into the dance floor. No one has even spiked the punch bowl yet tonight, and Emma is still having the best time.

A slow song starts, and Killian pulls her towards him, wrapping his arms around her waist. Emma knows he’s holding her too tight, too close, but it feels so good she can’t bring herself to take a step back. It’s different now than their silliness at prom last year, Killian’s arms solid and safe now, his hands feeling like they’re burning her skin through her dress. She’s so happy.

There are snacks, later, and someone does spike the punch bowl, and Ruby gets the DJ to play a line dance, and Will gets them all invites to the after party, and Killian twirls Emma around the floor for every slow song. It might be cliche, but the night is pretty magical.

“I’m having the best time,” Emma says, hand on the back of Killian’s neck, looking up at him. Yes, they’re too close, and Regina has all but pulled Emma aside to scold her, but mostly she can’t be bothered to care. “I wish this wasn’t our last night together for a long time.”

“It doesn’t have to be,” Killian says, face serious. Emma furrows her brow. “Dump him.”

Emma knows the music is still playing, but she can’t hear it. She drops her arms, taking a step back. “Did you actually just say that to me?”

“Aye, and I mean it.”

“You can literally go fuck yourself.” Emma turns on her heel and strides across the gym, pushing open the back doors into the hallway, and then again, stepping outside. It’s freezing, threatening snow.

Killian follows her. Of course. And he drapes his jacket over her shoulders before saying a word, of course. She wants to shrug it off, but it is cold out, and his jacket is so warm. So safe.

“Please, Emma, explain to me why saying that is so offensive to you?”

“He’s your friend and he’s my boyfriend and I can’t just do that to him because in this moment, you’re interested in me.” She’s still shivering a little, but underneath she feels hot, angry. “No offense but you’ve never made a relationship work for more than three months. I’m not throwing away what I have with Neal so you can get bored of me in a few weeks. I mean, you already seem bored of Milah and you haven’t even had to see her in months.”

“Screw Milah,” Killian says, voice rough. “That’s not-“

“I’m sure you have.” Emma rolls her eyes as she cuts him off.

“Says the girl who thought she was pregnant six months ago?” Killian raises his eyebrows at her, and Emma’s shoulders fall, just a little. “I don’t see what us getting off with other people has to do with anything.”

“Isn’t that the point of this?” Emma gestures between them. “We’re just friends who accidentally made things physical.”

Killian just looks at her, not saying anything for a long time. “If that’s what it is to you, then I guess it should be over.” He holds out his hand. “Can I have my jacket back?”

Emma practically throws it at him and heads back inside. She’s shaking, from the cold and from so much more. “Is the limo back yet?” She asks Regina as she’s grabbing her phone and jacket from the table.

“I was just going to go look for you, Emma. Yes, it’s out front.”

Emma leaves without another word, saying hello to the driver before climbing in the backseat. It’s dark and quiet and she can hear the sound of her breathing. She tries to focus on that, but there are tears pricking at the corner of her eyes and she can’t hold them back anymore.

Emma is practically sobbing when Regina and Robin get in the car. Regina takes one look at her and tells the driver to bring them home, that Will and Belle can figure out something else. She pulls Emma into an awkward hug, rubbing circles on her back while Emma keeps crying. Robin hands her a water bottle from the mini fridge and tissues from Regina’s purse, and Emma feels so stupid crying in front of them, but she can’t stop.

“I think Killian and I aren’t gonna be friends anymore,” she manages, finally, sitting back and dabbing at her eyes with a tissue.

“Oh, Emma,” Regina says, her voice filled with sadness for her. “I’m so sorry it ended like this.”

They pull up at Emma’s house and she gets out with a mumbled “thank you.” It’s started to snow, just a little, light flurries dusting onto the grass and Emma makes her way up her front walk, careful not to slip. The house is quiet, her parents not expecting her for hours, probably, so she makes her way through the darkness to her bedroom as silently as possible.

She gets undressed in a daze, washing her makeup off, taking her hair down. It was supposed to be such a good night. Killian ruined everything, and she wants to be mad at him, and she is, but mostly she’s just sad.

Emma pulls on his tee shirt without thinking about it, crawling into bed. She swears she can still smell him everywhere, on the shirt, in her sheets, and she feels like she’s going to start crying again. She let everything go too far.

She scrolls through her phone until her eyelids get heavy, sleep approaching. Absentmindedly, she opens her text thread with Killian, reading back, all the hearts and flirty messages and “ _I miss you”_ s. She’s typing before she can stop herself, deleting and rewording it, saying things she knows she’ll regret in the morning.

_Tonight was a bad night and I just wish I could talk about it with my best friend. I miss you._

He doesn’t respond.

—-

Emma doesn’t remember much of the last week of classes before Christmas break. She gives an oral presentation on Jane Eyre in English class, she manages to get a B on a Calculus test that she only studied for at lunch, and she doesn’t speak to Killian once. She eats lunch in the library with Belle one day, and in Miss Blanchard’s classroom another, and just avoids everywhere he could be, including skipping microbio one day because she doesn’t even want to _see_ him.

Neal comes home on Thursday, and Emma vows to just pay attention to him. This time last year, they were spending hours in the town library, sneaking into his dad’s office, trying to find the truth about his mom, and Emma wishes it could be like that again.

She sleeps over his house and wants it to be like it used to be, but even when he’s on top of her, their bodies moving together in the dimmed lights of his bedroom, she thinks of Killian and hates herself.

They grab dinner at Granny’s the day before Christmas Eve, drinking milkshakes and laughing, and everything is good. She made the right choice.

“I’ve been thinking a lot about my dad,” Neal says, examining an onion ring. “Taking Psych 101 really made me look at him differently.”

“How so?” Emma asks, tilting her head.

“He’s done his best with a shitty situation, you know? Yeah, I wish he had told me the truth about my mom so that I could have a relationship with her and find her before she actually _did_ die, but.” He shrugs. “He stayed and she didn’t I don’t know why I’ve been blaming him for that.”

Emma reaches across the table and takes his hand. “I think that’s the most mature thing I’ve ever heard anyone say.”

Neal sits up straighter, adjusts the collar of his jacket. “Well I’m a very mature college guy now, you see.”

Emma laughs, and Neal laughs, and for a moment, she just lets herself be happy.

She hears Killian’s voice before she seems him, and looks up. His leaning against the counter, waiting for a take out order. Emma holds her breath, praying that he doesn’t turn around

“Jones,” Neal shouts, standing, and Killian turns.

Emma is pretty sure she falls straight through the floor, dropping out the bottom of Granny’s and straight through the earth. Killian looks so tired, so soft and sleepy, like that time he stayed over, except sadder. She wants to stand up and give him a hug and never let go.

And then Killian flashes a grin and walks across the dinner to them, all bright and cheery to the point that Emma wonders if she imagined everything else. “Didn’t know you’d be here, mate. Thought I wouldn’t have to face my tragic loss in FIFA for another few days.”

Neal smiles proudly. “It was pretty embarrassing, man. Isn’t that the sport of your country or some shit?”

Killian fakes shocked, putting a hand to his heart. “I consider myself an American now.”

“Wait, you guys hung out?” Emma asks, hearing her voice before she even makes the decision to speak.

Neal looks at her. Killian does not. “Yeah, yesterday. Sorry we didn’t invite you, it was just video games,” Neal explains.

“Oh, yeah.” Emma clears her throat. “Of course, I don’t care.” She pauses again, and looks between the two of them. “I think I should go now, Neal. I’ve been out for a while.”

“I can give you a ride home,” Neal says, reaching across the table for her.

“I’ll see you after Christmas,” she says in a rush, sliding out the booth. When she stands, her arm brushes up against Killian, startling her, making her almost drop her phone. She takes a deep breath, one second to compose herself, and leaves.

The air is bitter cold, wind blowing and sidewalks slippery, but Emma walks hone. She needs the fresh air, time to clear her head. Her head is never clear anymore, just full of so much noise and memories and wishes and guilt.

She thinks, sometimes, that she would take it all back, undo everything, walk home alone on Halloween. And sometimes she feels so sure that she wouldn’t change a single second that she burns with shame.

Tonight, alone with the snow and the stars, she thinks she’d do it all exactly the same, every time.

——

Christmas passes in a blur, full of good food and family and snow and happiness, mostly. At eighteen, some of the Christmas magic is lost, but Emma soaks in what she can, baking cookies and sprinkling cinnamon on their hot cocoas with her mom, having a Christmas movie marathon with her dad, building a snowman with her cousins. It’s nice.

Even if she should be grabbing her coolest present and running through the snow to Killian’s house, eating the candy his grandparents sent over and distracting him as his dad got drunker and meaner. One year, lying on his bedroom floor and looking up at the still faintly glowing stars they had stuck on the ceiling years before, Killian had taken her hand, holding it between their bodies, neither of them letting go or even moving for so long, waiting for his dad to go to bed.

Neal and Emma had first kissed on New Year’s Day, in a dark closet in his dad’s shop. They consider that their anniversary, even if technically Neal didn’t ask her to be his girlfriend until the next day. Emma thinks it’s pretty romantic, to start a new year like that.

She hopes, somehow, that their kiss at midnight will break some curse and fix everything she’s ruined.

Neal gets to her house hours before midnight, plenty of time to eat endless snacks and watch all the terrible countdown shows. Her parents are at the mayor’s party, not expected back till long after midnight, so they have the house to themselves for hours.

One of the first things Neal does, once they’ve settled on the couch, is pull out her present. It’s a small wrapped box, silver wrapping paper, bright red bow, and Emma gasps. “It’s just a little thing. I know you said you didn’t want anything, but I saw this and couldn’t resist.”

Emma unwraps it and opens the box. Nestled on a dark bed of tissue paper is a delicate silver chain holding a small circular charm, a swan in the middle “It’s beautiful,” she breathes, running her fingers over the ridges. It’s more beautiful than she deserves.

Neal leans forward, takes the necklace, and hooks it around her neck. “I love you,” he says.

“I love you too.” Emma kisses him, smiling against his lips. This moment is one she wants to remember, to hold on to the next time she gets confused.

The snacks are great, the shows are funny, the company is perfect. Sometimes, during a commercial break, or when Neal gets up to get more pretzels, she thinks about Killian, about how last she heard, way back before the dance, was that Milah was coming to town for New Year’s Eve. They’re probably at a party, being hot and charming and British. She knows Killian isn’t thinking of her in the quiet moments, no matter what he had said about liking her.

Ryan Seacrest is doing some weird bit with a singer Emma has never heard of, midnight just over half an hour away, when the doorbell rings. Neither of them move, and it rings again.

Emma groans, standing up. “If this is my drunk parents who have lost their keys and can’t get in the house, I’m gonna be so pissed.” Neal laughs.

It’s not her parents. It’s Killian, standing in her porch light, in his big leather coat and no gloves or a hat because he’s stupid, he’s always been stupid about the cold. Emma takes a step towards him, and stops.

“What are you doing here?” she hisses. She glances back at the living room, where Neal is already not paying attention to them.

“We need to talk,” Killian whispers back. “I just need five minutes, Emma.”

Emma wants to say no, slam the door in his face, but she thinks she owes him more than that after all these years. “Neal,” she yells into the living room, “Killian is here and wants to talk about something, I’ll be right back.”

“Okay,” Neal yells back, as Emma grabs her puffiest coat off the hook, steps into her most worn-in boots, and follows Killian outside.

He heads down the porch steps, walking away from the house, and Emma almost has to jog to catch up. “Stop walking, Killian.”

He turns when she says his name. “I need to talk to you about so many things.”

“You said that already.” She crosses her arms in front of her chest, waiting. “Shouldn’t you be at a party with your girlfriend or something?”

Killian laughs humorlessly. “That’s the first thing. She’s not here. I’ve been lying to you.”

“That’s not a great opening line,” Emma says, rolling her eyes. “Talk to me, I’m a liar?”

“I broke up with Milah weeks ago. Before the dance. Right after,” he gestures to the upstairs of her house, and Emma knows what he means. The night her slept over, maybe the best night of her entire life.

She feels dizzy, half of her so happy, half of her so mad. “So you promised to be honest with me, and immediately lied.”

“I didn’t want you to feel like I was pressuring you to break up with Neal.” He takes a step towards her, barely an inch, but Emma sees it. “I broke up with her because I realized what I wanted, and it wasn’t her. But I don’t know what you want, so I couldn’t ask the same of you.”

“But you did,” Emma says slowly. “At the dance. You told me to dump him.”

Killian looks frustrated, at himself, at her, at everything. He lets out an exhausted sigh. “I fucked up,” he admits. “I got caught up in all the formalwear and crossed a line, I can admit that now.”

Emma lets her shoulders drop. “Why couldn’t you have apologized weeks ago?”

“I was hurt, Emma. When you said this was an accident, that we were just friends,” he trails off, and Emma watches him, sees how completely wrecked he looks.

“Am I wrong?”

“You really don’t know?” He pauses, plays with the ring on his thumb, and then looks up at her. “I’m in love with you.”

Emma steps back, as if his words have force and they’ve knocked her over. Killian takes a step forward, reaching to steady her, but she stops him, stands firmly on her own, squeezes her eyes shut. “You’re not.” It’s barely a whisper, barely a breath.

“I am. Think I always have been, really.” Emma doesn’t respond, just stares, shaking a little. “I just wanted to tell you the truth and maybe we can move on.”

He takes another step towards her, moving like he might hug her, and then stops. He gives her a tight, small smile, a curt nod, and then he just walks away. Emma watches, and stands there for so long the cold starts to seep in.

Back inside, Neal asks her what Killian wanted as she’s hanging up her coat. “He broke up with Milah, I guess. He just wanted to talk about it for a minute.”

“That sucks,” Neal offers, and Emma chokes out a laugh.

They settle back down together on the couch, Neal throwing a blanket over their lap, to wait for midnight. They kiss when the ball drops and Neal whispers, “Happy New Year,” and Emma starts it thinking about Killian.

—-

Emma doesn’t get out of bed for two days.

She’s not really one for wallowing, but considering she has to go back to school on Tuesday and pretend to be a normal person, she lets herself, for once. Her mom asks her if she’s sick, and she just lets her believe that, especially since it gets her grilled cheese sandwiches delivered right to her bed. She doesn’t wash her hair or change out of sweatpants, and she looks as pathetic as she feels on the inside.

Killian is in love with her.

That’s not something she ever prepared for, not once in her life, not even in the last few months. She knew she had a crush on him, and believed him when he said he felt the same, but that’s completely different from _love_. That’s so big, so scary.

Emma isn’t even sure she’s _in love_ with Neal after a whole year, and Killian just sounded so sure of himself. It makes him asking her to dump Neal a little more understandable. If all of this meant something to him, it colors every conversation they ever had, every moment, him holding her in bed and telling her to pick him.

On Monday, her last day of winter break, her parents go to work and Emma has the house to herself. She orders pizza for lunch and puts The Notebook on in the living room and even thinks about showering.

The doorbell rings about five minutes after she places her order, so she’s pretty sure it’s not the food. She’s worried it’s Neal, wondering why she’s been avoiding him, and she just does not have the energy for that today. Or ever, probably.

It’s Killian, again. Will it be Killian on the other side of her door every day for the rest of her life?

“I thought you were pizza,” Emma says, standing in the doorway. Killian looks like she feels, and a bit like she looks, too. Bags under his eyes, messy hair, his stubble way past the five o’clock shadow look he usually has. He’s wearing real pants, not sweats, so he has her beat there.

“Not pizza. Just someone who has had a rough week and wants to see their best friend.”

Emma steps back, and lets him inside.

He kicks off his shoes - a house rule - but keeps his jacket on, wandering towards the living room and the tv. Noah and Allie are dancing in the street, falling in love.

“Do you have specific things you want to talk about?” Emma asks, standing next to him.

He turns to her and smiles a little. “I’m sorry, Emma. I shouldn’t have come here the other night.”

“No.” She reaches out and touches his arm, fingers light, barely a graze. “I appreciate the honesty, Killian. It was just a bit overwhelming.” She gestures to her sweatpants, her messy hair. “I haven’t really been processing it very well.”

“You look beautiful to me,” he says, voice soft and honest.

Emma rolls her eyes. “Well now I know you’re in love with me so I can’t trust your opinion anymore. I might be the ugliest person on earth.”

Killian laughs a little, and Emma smiles back at him without meaning to. It shouldn’t be this easy to just be normal with him. It should still feel so hard. “You’re going to use that against me now, aren’t you?” He asks.

“Oh, always. If we ever disagree, I win because you’re in love with me.” She shrugs, and Killian laughs again, and then they both just stand there smiling at each other for a minute, like total idiots.

The pizza guy shows up, then, and Emma brings the food into the living room. “Don’t judge me for the large, okay? I’m depressed.”

Killian drops down onto the couch next to her. “Why are you depressed, love?”

She sighs, turning to face him, legs folded under her on the couch. “I just feel kind of lost. I watch a shitty movie with a love triangle,” she gestures to the screen, “and it all seems so romantic, but in reality, it just sucks.”

“Haven’t you made up your mind, though? You and Neal seem rather cozy now.” Killian is looking at her, and he doesn’t look happy, but he doesn’t look mad, either. Like he’s made his peace with all of it.

“I haven’t decided anything,” she admits, voice soft. “I just thought you weren’t an option anymore so I was making things work with Neal.”

Killian frowns. “I’m sorry I fucked that all up for you, then.”

“No, it’s not that.” Emma slides towards him on the couch, until her knees bump against his thigh. “It’s just so confusing because I think I have feelings for you, too, and I didn’t think you’d ever feel the same way. I thought this was just fun for you.”

Killian reaches across the space between them to brush a bit of her messy hair out of her face. “I loved you the whole time.”

Emma doesn’t mean to kiss him. She’s told herself so many times that the kissing was done, that she was going to focus on Neal, that whatever feelings Killian might have had didn’t matter, because whatever was going on between them was over. She promised herself she would behave, and do the right thing, and if she ever kissed Killian again, it would be when she was single.

But she kisses him anyway.

Killian sighs against her mouth, hand immediately moving to the back of her neck, pulling her closer. Emma can’t believe she let herself go so long without this. She needs this.

She climbs on his lap, straddling him, kissing him deeper, harder. His hands are on her waist, fingers sliding under her tee shirt, everything so familiar. She’s on fire, practically panting into his mouth, needing more, somehow.

“Upstairs,” she gasps, practically falling off him and grabbing his hand. Killian doesn’t say anything, just stands, taking her hand, letting her pull him up the stairs. He wraps his arms around her once they reach her bedroom, pressing tight against her, kissing the shell of her ear, the soft skin down the side of her neck.

She turns in his arms, leading them towards the bed while taking his jacket off, everything feeling simultaneously desperate and slow, hurried and so delicate, so meaningful. She gets Killian’s shirt off before they land on the bed, even with all the buttons, and then he’s on top of her, shirtless and breathing hard, and Emma tries to pull him closer, wants to feel him everywhere.

She loses time, minutes or hours or days could be passing, them in her bed, peeling each other’s clothes off so slowly, hands everywhere. She doesn’t want to think of Neal, but she can’t help it, can’t help but think that it’s never been like this with him, not even at the beginning, not even when they first started having sex and couldn’t keep their hands off each other. It’s always been different with Killian. She’s not sure if it’s good or bad, but she knows it’s different.

“I love you,” Killian whispers between kisses and Emma falls apart in his hands. She wants to say it back, can feel the words on the tip of her tongue, brushing up against Killian’s as they kiss, but she can’t. She doesn’t know how.

Her leg is wrapped around him, holding him against her, their bodies undulating, and she reaches into her nightstand drawer for a condom. She moves to open it, and Killian grabs her wrist. “We can’t.”

Emma makes a face, wrinkling her nose. “But I want to.”

Killian smiles, and presses a soft kiss to that still-wrinkled nose. “I do too, love, but that’s just not enough. We’ve gotta draw the line somewhere, and that’s mine.” He rolls off of her to lie next to her, drawing shapes on her bare stomach with his fingertips. “I love you. When we sleep together, I want it to be just the two of us in this.”

Emma reaches up and runs her fingers through his hair. “You know I more than just like you a little bit, right?”

Killian turns his head to press a kiss to her wrist. “I hoped you did. But I can wait.” He laughs a little, and it sounds sad. “I’ve been waiting for years already.”

Emma pulls him back towards her, fitting their bodies together. “Let’s take a nap and then eat cold pizza.”

Killian presses his lips against her jaw. “Maybe we can even get you in the shower later.”

Emma punches him and Killian laughs, the vibrations humming through Emma’s body. She sleeps better than she has in weeks.

—-

It’s almost two when Emma wakes up to Killian kissing her, and she opens her mouth for him before even opening her eyes. “You looked so peaceful but I couldn’t resist you.”

Emma wraps her arms around his neck. “I was dreaming about you.” She kisses him. “But this is better.”

They kiss for a bit longer, until Emma’s stomach growls and they have to admit the need to get out of bed, get dressed, and eat lunch. They can’t keep their hands off each other, Killian resting his chin on the top of her head while she looks for plates, and Emma keeps stopping what she’s doing to kiss him.

“When we have our own place, we can do this without putting clothes on,” he whispers in her ear.

Emma turns to look at him, raising an eyebrow. “When? You’re that confident this is going to work out?”

“Aye,” Killian says, and kisses her. “I’m staying optimistic for the both of us.”

Emma never turned the movie off, so Netflix just started playing something else, some cheesy Hallmark movie they’ve never seen. They watch it anyway, mocking all the dialogue, laughing at the cliche plot points. They’ve watched so many bad movies just like this, under blankets on her couch, eating junk food and laughing. It feels like it always has, but better.

Is this what it would be like, always, if she took the leap and let herself be with Killian, for real?

“You need to take a shower and I need to go home,” Killian announces when the movie is over.

Emma pouts. “I don’t want you to leave and I don’t want to shower alone.”

Killian reaches for her, pulling her into his arms on the couch. “If I see you naked, dear, I’m never leaving.”

“Good,” Emma says defiantly, and Killian kisses her cheek.

They finally stand, extricating themselves from the couch and the blankets and the kisses, and Emma walks him to the door. “I know you just came over today to apologize, but I’m happy this all happened, too.”

Killian leans forward, resting his forehead against hers. “Me too, love.”

Emma watches him leave, and then finally takes her much-needed shower, music turned up loud in the bathroom, hot water and alternative rock drowning out all her thoughts. She just lets herself be happy.

When she gets out, wrapping her hair in a towel, she has a missed call and a few texts from Neal. He wants to hang out tonight, practically invites himself over, and Emma says okay. It’s not like she doesn’t want to see him, she just thought she’d have a few more days to figure things out.

Neal comes by after dinner and they watch Netflix on her laptop, cuddled together in her bed. The algorithm is recommending a lot of bad romantic comedies now. Neal makes fun of her and Emma groans, hiding her face in his shoulder, swearing she doesn’t usually like that shit.

They watch Iron Man, and it’s all nice and everything, but Emma feels anxious the whole time, almost like there’s something crawling under her skin. When the movie ends, she closes her laptop and sits up.

“I need to tell you something and you’re going to be so pissed, so I just want to disclaimer this by saying I’m so sorry and I should have told you earlier,” she says in a rush.

Neal looks confused. “You’re scaring me, Emma. Is everything okay?”

She reaches for his hands and squeezes them. “Everything is fine.” She wants to tell him everything, dump it all out onto her mattress, take the weight off her shoulders, finally, but the words won’t come. She can’t do that to him. “On Halloween, we were really drunk. Like, everybody. But Killian and me especially.” She swallows. “We kissed.”

His eyes widen, mouth literally falling open. “You and Killian kissed?”

“I know, I’m so sorry. It was so stupid and I should have told you right away.” She moves closer to him on the bed, still holding his hands. “I screwed up.”

Neal nods slowly, like it’s taking him a second to process this. It’s only the tiniest fragment of the truth and Emma can see he can barely handle it. She can’t believe she almost told him everything. “It didn’t mean anything, right?”

Emma pauses for what feels like too long, but Neal doesn’t seem to notice. “It meant we were drunk.”

“Okay.” He pulls his hands away from hers to raise one hand to her cheek. “It’s okay. We’re okay.”

Emma smiles shakily and leans forward to kiss him. He meets her lips eagerly, like forgiveness, but Emma know she doesn’t deserve it. She kisses him, takes his forgiveness, and lies to him again.

——

It feels worse to be doing this while Neal is still in town.

Emma drives Killian to school again, fingers interlaced between them, but she’s scared the whole time. Like somehow this is wrong, like if someone sees her giving her friend a ride to school, they’re going to figure everything out and immediately run and tell Neal. She feels guilty every time she looks at Killian, but sad when they’re not together. Every morning, she tells herself she’s going to leave early, before Killian, and every morning, she waits for him.

“Every day I wake up and do this stupid affirmations, like today is the day. I’m gonna figure it all out, I’m gonna break up with someone, I’m gonna be a good person,” she says as they drive. “And every day I panic about it and drag it out longer.”

“Hey,” Killian says firmly, reaching to take her hand. He brings it to his mouth and kisses all of her knuckles, one at a time. “You are a good person. If this decision was easy, _that_ would make you a bad person.”

Emma raises an eyebrow at him. “That sounds like a bit of a stretch, but I’ll take it.” She sighs. “Neal goes back to New York on Sunday. I think I’ll be able to think more clearly when he’s gone.”

At school, they hang out at Emma’s locker, waiting for homeroom. They’re standing too close, foreheads touching while they talk, making it feel like they’re in their own personal bubble.

“So I guess this is happening again,” Regina drawls, walking over to them from her locker across the hall. “I thought you were done after you cried in my limo.”

“You cried in her limo?” Killian asks, putting his hand on Emma’s arm.

“I’d love if you didn’t scream it down the hallways, Regina,” Emma snapped.

Regina rolled her eyes. “I think the two of you are doing enough of that for everyone. Just try to be a little more subtle, unless you want Neal to find out through the rumor mill.” She turns on her heel and walks away, and Emma lets her head fall back against the lockers behind us.

“She’s right, you know. We really shouldn’t be touching in public.”

Killian’s hand is still on her arm. “It’s going to make me even more desperate for you when we’re alone.”

Emma turns to him, flashing a bright, mischievous smile. “Maybe that’s not a bad thing.”

“You having to work tonight is cruel,” he says, giving her arm a squeeze before stepping away. Emma laughs.

She has a short shift at Granny’s after school, just through the dinner rush, and the first hour is always completely dead. She refills the salt and pepper shakers, sweeps the floor, and then is mostly out of things to do until the regulars start arriving around five. She hops up on a stool at the counter and pulls out her notebook, going over her college application checklist.

She already applied to Storybrooke College and NYU, and was just waiting for her last letter of recommendation for the University of Maine and Fordham. Then there is the problem of USC. She had filled everything out, all she had to do was submit it by the end of the week, but something kept stopping her.

It was like if she applied to USC, she had made her choice. Or at least, for the first time, she acknowledged that there was a real choice here, another future than what she’d been imagining for the last year and a half, if not longer. There was another coast and another city and another boy who wanted to be with her. It’s terrifying.

“You on a break?” Emma startles at the voice, and turns to see Neal behind her. He kisses her cheek quickly and sits down next to her. “Doing homework?”

Emma groans. “I honestly wish I was. I’m finishing up my college apps.”

Neal grimaces. “The worst part. As long as it’s in New York, we’re good.”

Emma closes her notebook and stares at the cover for a long time. “I am applying other places, though. Like I might stay in Maine. Or go to California.”

Neal looks at her like she just started speaking Russian. “California? Since when?”

She shrugs. “Killian wants to go out there and he basically begged me to apply with him.”

He laughs a little. “You guys are a little codependent, maybe you need four years apart.”

Emma opens her mouth to argue, but Granny is coming out from the back, and she needs to look busy, at least. “I have to go back to work, but you’re still coming over Sunday, right? Before you leave?”

“I can’t wait.” He leans across the counter and kisses her quickly before jumping back off the stool and leaving. Emma watches him go, feeling weird and sad, and she can’t tell if she’s sad for him or for herself.

When she gets home after work, the first thing she does is submit her USC application. She texts a photo of it to Killian, and he responds with probably fifty heart emojis, mixed in with some palm trees and suns. She hasn’t made up her mind about her future, but she wants everything to be a possibility.

—-

Emma wakes early on Saturday morning, like it’s Christmas, like she didn’t just see Killian eighteen hours ago. She lays in bed, listening to her mom get ready to head into work, apparently doing inventory or taxes or whatever small business owners have to do on Saturday. The house is quiet other than that, her dad on a business trip in Houston for a few days, and Emma can’t believe she’s so lucky. Usually, they just get a few hours together, but today, the house should be empty till 5.

Emma is pretty sure no other eighteen year olds get so excited to just lay around in sweatpants and not have sex with their secret boyfriend, but she can’t help herself. Besides, there are plenty of things they can do that don’t violate Killian’s no-sex rule.

Her mom finally leaves for the day and Emma jumps out of bed to take a shower. Killian says she’s always beautiful, but she thinks for once she could curl her hair and put on some lipgloss.

She methodically checks off items on her morning to-do list: shower, hair, coffee, clean room. Killian planned on coming over at noon, but Emma is getting antsy at a little after 10am.

_Come over now before I lose my mind_

Killian is opening her door less than ten minutes later.

Emma practically runs towards him and he opens his arms for her, their lips crashing together. She feels like he almost lifts her off the ground, turning them and slamming her against the wall, gentle enough to not hurt, but hard enough to make her lose her breath. She gasps into his mouth, letting herself relax into him, lets him and the wall support her. It’s the first deep breath she’s taken in days.

“Your hair is wet,” she says with a laugh, fingers tangling in the dark strands.

“You told me to come over now. I couldn’t keep you waiting.” He drags his lips down her neck, kissing and nibbling, making her squirm against him.

“Very obedient, I like that.” They kiss for a bit longer, until Emma is tired of standing and pulls back. “I haven’t eaten yet. Want to help me make breakfast?”

She leads him into the kitchen, where she rummages through the fridge and pulls out eggs. “I hope you don’t expect any real help, love. I’m useless in the kitchen.”

Emma shrugs. “I can make eggs and cereal and maybe pancakes, on a good day.” She turns to him and looks him up and down. “I think you’re just the eye candy here.”

Killian tries to pretend to be offended, but Emma can see him fighting a smile. He hops up on the counter to watch her cook. “This is all quite domestic, no?”

Emma smiles to herself, stirring the eggs around the pan like she knows what she’s doing. “You keep saying that. I think you might love me.”

Killian reaches forward and tugs on the strap of her tank top, making her turn to face him. “You know I do.” He reaches for the spatula to pull her forward, but Emma just laughs and turns back to the stove.

“I’m not burning our gourmet breakfast so you can get a few more kisses.”

Killian pouts, but the eggs turn out pretty well, so he can’t really complain.

They spend the rest of the morning starting a marathon of a new Netflix series, laying on the couch, his arms around her. They miss some important plot points because of equally important kissing breaks, and Emma doesn’t care. She’s just happy to be spending the day with him, like they used to do all the time. Just with more kissing now.

The last of Emma’s Christmas candy becomes their lunch, including a heated debate over which terrible fruit-flavored candy cane is the best. Killian says orange, which is just wrong, even if it makes his mouth taste delicious.

Emma leads him upstairs eventually, ignoring all the mess downstairs and making him promise to help clean it up before he leaves. He agrees, but she doesn’t think he’s listening anymore. He would agree to anything she says.

They spend the next hour or so messing up her fresh sheets and perfectly made bed, laughing and kissing and touching. Emma gets to be as loud as she wants, Killian’s long fingers inside her, not worried about anything. Killian breathes an “I love you” when he comes, and Emma rests her chin on his thigh and smiles up at him.

She’s so happy.

She crawls back up to him, kissing up his body until she reaches his mouth, and then she just smiles down at him. “I’m not good at seeing the future,” she confesses, voice low. “I think that’s what makes all of this so hard. I spent so much of my childhood just getting through the day that I’m not sure I know how to imagine anything else. I know what I’m doing today. I know what I’m feeling today. That’s it.”

Killian rests his forehead against hers. “Do you want me to tell you what I can see, and maybe you’ll see it too?”

Emma curls up against him, head on his chest. “Tell me.”

His voice is so soothing, soft and melodic, and Emma closes her eyes. “We go to California and we leave everyone behind and make our own life, just you and me and all the good things our rubbish childhoods took from us. We’ll see all the tourist traps and hike to the Hollywood sign and make out in that famous planetarium. We’ll smoke legal weed and go to college parties and Lakers games.” He runs his fingers through her hair, pausing, taking a minute to think of what is next. “We can get our own place that we can see the ocean from and we’ll never wear clothes and I’ll ravish you on every surface.”

Emma laughs and props herself up on her elbow to look at him better. “I want all of that.”

“Aye?” He lifts his hand to her cheek. “I think you’ve made your decision, love.”

She closes her eyes, focusing on his touch. “I think I have too.”

From somewhere far away, the doorbell rings.

“Did we order food and I forgot?” Emma asks, sitting up. The clock on her dresser is flashing 3:38. It rings again, and she groans. “I’ll be right back.”

She pulls her underwear and tank top back on, and then wraps herself in a fluffy bathrobe, tying it tightly, not wanting to give FedEx a show on a Saturday afternoon. She knows she should probably put pants on, but she can’t be bothered. She only has an hour left with Killian, and taking pants back off takes way too long.

Except that it’s not FedEx, or pizza, or even her parents.

“Hey,” Neal says, smiling and stepping forward to kiss her.

Emma takes a step backwards. “Aren’t we hanging out tomorrow? I wasn’t planning on having to look like a real person today.” She gestures to her bathrobe and messy hair. Her hands are shaking.

“My dad wants to leave earlier to miss the traffic into Boston, I guess.” Neal shrugs, and takes a step towards her, into the house. “I figured we could hang out this afternoon instead.”

“It’s not that I’m not so excited to see you,” she says in a rush. “I’m just busy.”

He glances towards the living room, where there’s a pile of candy on the couch and the Netflix menu on the tv, and chuckles. “You look so busy.” He reaches for her, wrapping his arm around her waist, and Emma tries to relax into it, but she can’t breathe. “Your parents aren’t home today, right?”

“They’re not, but my mom will be any minute.” Neal kisses her and she kisses back, mind reeling, going through every excuse she’s ever made up in her entire life, anything to get him out of the house.

There’s a crash from upstairs. Not loud, but they can hear it. It sounds like Killian knocked something off her desk while looking for his clothes.

Neal pulls back, looking up the staircase. “I thought you said your parents aren’t home?”

“Shit just falls sometimes,” she says with a shrug. “I should probably go check on it, and you should just let me know when you’re leaving and I’ll come by to say goodbye.”

Neal stares at her, his eyebrows coming together in confusion. “You’re acting weird.”

“I’m not,” she says simply.

He keeps looking at her, making her feel sick, and then he reaches out slowly, touching the side of her neck. It’s tender under his fingertips and she winces. He draws his hand back slowly, and looks back up the stairs.

“Killian, you can come out now,” he yells, and Emma almost collapses. Her face is hot, she’s lightheaded, like right before that time she passed out in eighth grade. Is she gonna pass out?

“Neal, he’s not here,” she thinks she says, but Neal doesn’t react, and then suddenly, Killian is standing at the top of the stairs, barefoot in his jeans and wrinkled tee shirt.

“Okay.” Neal looks back and forth between both of them for a long minute and then turns and walks back out the front door.

Emma runs after him. “Wait, Neal. It’s not-“

“Please don’t lie to me anymore, Emma.” Neal sounds so defeated, turning slowly to face her. He’s at the bottom of her porch steps, looking up at her. “I think you’ve been doing it long enough.”

“I didn’t mean for this to happen,” she insists. She’s shivering in her robe. She can hear Killian come down a few steps, and holds her hand out behind her to make him stop. He’ll just make it worse.

“Do you think I’m an idiot, Emma? That’s really what you’ve been treating me like.” He runs his fingers through his hair, like Emma knows he always does when he’s angry and trying to control himself. “This is so messed up. You couldn’t even wait till I went back to school? And since Halloween?”

“We stopped for a while, I tried to stop it.”

Neal laughs, humorlessly, and it gives Emma chills. He sounds like his dad, for a second. “So it stopped, you lied to me about it being a one time meaningless thing, and now it’s started again.” He shakes his head. “You could’ve just broken up with me months ago.”

Emma feels her eyes filling up with tears, and she hates them. “I love you, though. I didn’t want to break up with you.”

Neal takes a step forward like he’s going to walk back up the steps to her, and then stops. “You don’t fucking love me, Emma. You don’t do this to people you love.”

She takes a step down towards him and Neal backs up. “I’m so sorry. Please, let me explain.”

“There’s nothing to explain.” He shoves his hands deep in his coat pockets and exhales. “I’ll make it easier for you. You don’t have a boyfriend anymore. And you can let Killian know he can delete my number, too.”

He walks away, ignoring her calling his name after him. She drops down onto the top step and lets the tears fall, lets them sting her cheeks in the cold air. Killian sits next to her then, throwing his arm over her shoulder, and she buries her face in his chest. She can’t stop crying. Everything hurts.

—-

Killian stays, even after her mom gets home.

He cleans up downstairs while she crawls into her bed, pulling the covers over her head. He brings her a glass of water and a box of tissues. He tells her mom that she’s dealing with something and needs her space. He brings her a plate of dinner, placing it on her nightstand, and sitting down in her desk chair.

“You can go home,” she says eventually, emerging from under the blankets. “I’m just gonna be like this for the next three days.”

Killian gets up and kneels down next to the side of her bed, so they’re eye level. “I’ll stay as long as you want me to.”

That just makes Emma cry again.

He reaches out and brushes the tears from her cheeks, and then kisses her forehead. “I love you.”

Emma grabs his wrist, tugging at the same time as she slides back in her bed, towards the wall, making room for him. “I need a hug.” He obeys, climbing in after her and wrapping his arms around her.

“I’m so sorry it happened this way.”

They’re quiet for a long time, and then Emma looks up at him. “I think we should take a break from this. For a little while. I don’t want to hurt Neal more by flaunting our relationship.”

Killian doesn’t respond, just lays there, rubbing circles on her back almost absentmindedly. “If that’s what you really want.”

“I think it’s what we need to do.”

She doesn’t feel good about any of this. She’s hurt Neal enough, and the idea of him finding out that her and Killian are really dating now, as if he never mattered to her, make her feel sick, like the worst person on earth. If she loved Neal like she said she did, she needs to mourn that relationship.

“I won’t pretend that doesn’t piss me off a bit, love, but I understand.” He pauses, giving her a tight squeeze. “I can go now.”

“Wait,” she whispers, resting her head back on his chest. “I just need a few more minutes.”

He holds her while she cries about another boy, while she cries about what they’re doing, and if Emma ever doubted how much he loved her before, she doesn’t anymore. She’s not sure she deserves to be loved that much, but she wishes so badly that she will be able to hold onto it.

—-

Emma drives Killian to school, still, but they don’t hold hands. His fingers twitched when he got in the car, like he was going to reach for her and then remembered what they had agreed on. Instead, they’re silent most of the ride, the radio on, trying to drown out her thoughts.

“You know, you never really made a decision,” Killian says as they’re getting closer to school.

Emma tightens her grip on the steering wheel. “What do you mean?”

“If Neal hadn’t come over, you’d still be with him. You still might’ve chosen to be with him.”

Emma stares straight ahead, a lump forming in her throat. She’s done enough crying, she can’t cry again. “You really think that?”

Killian looks at her, sadness written all over his face. “I wish I didn’t, love.”

Emma has nothing to say to that, because it’s not like he’s wrong. She thought she had made up her mind, but she’s not very brave when it comes to matters of the heart. She’d sky dive without a second thought, but opening her heart up enough to figure out what she wants, enough to get hurt? It’s the scariest thing she’s ever imagined.

They’re at school early, so Killian hangs out at her locker, like he always has. They’re not touching, just talking, and Emma thinks they’re doing a great job of keeping things platonic.

Emma takes her scarf off to put it in her locker and Killian sucks in a breath. “I’m so sorry I did that,” he whispers, and Emma just shakes her head. The tiny bite mark that Neal saw on her neck has blossomed into a deep purple bruise over the last 48 hours. She considered covering it with makeup, but it was pointless. It’s not like she’s the first girl to come to school with a hickey.

She hears a low, appreciative whistle, and turns to see Will and Robin walking over. “Quite a love bite there, Swan. Impressive work, Jones.”

Emma and Killian both turn to stare at him, wide-eyed. “Why would you say that?” Emma asks. There’s no way Will knows, unless Regina and Robin told him.

“One, you’re bloody obvious about it. Two, Peter told us,” Will says, and shrugs. “Guess Neal told him and Peter can’t keep a secret.”

Emma groans and looks at Killian. “Why do we have so many British people at this school and why have they formed this terrible gossip gang?”

Killian laughs a little. “Don’t ask me, dear, I’m not part of their gang.”

“I’m sure no one else knows,” Robin says quickly. “We’ve got your back.”

“Thanks, I really don’t want to be the school slut this week.” They all laugh and Emma feels a little lighter. Her friends, even the ones who are friends with Neal, too, don’t hate her. She wonders if maybe that means she shouldn’t hate herself, either.

—-

Emma texts Neal a few times over the next two weeks, and he never responds. So when her phone lights up with his name on a Thursday evening, she almost knocks her laptop off her desk in her rush to answer it.

“Neal?”

“Yeah, who else would it be?” His voice sounds rough, far away. Emma aches.

“I didn’t expect you to call me. Or ever speak to me again.” She moves from her desk to her bed, sitting against the headboard, knees pulled to her chest.

“I thought I wouldn’t,” he says simply. “But then I realized that’s not fair to either of us. I still care about you.”

“I care about you, too. I know it doesn’t feel like that -“

“No, I know,” Neal interrupts. “I’ve been thinking about this a lot. The two of us, we didn’t grow up in the best environments for love. I never had a role model for what it’s like to love someone selflessly, and you spent years feeling unworthy of love or whatever the foster system did to you. That kind of damage together….” he trails off and sighs. “It wasn’t going to work.”

Emma knows he’s right. “It doesn’t make what I did to you okay, though.”

“Oh, fuck no. That was so shitty, Emma. I didn’t think you were capable of something like that. I thought you were too good.”

“I’m just a normal person, Neal,” she says sadly. “I’m not too good for anything.”

“I know that now, and I’m sorry I sort of put you on this pedestal.”

“Please don’t apologize to me, I don’t deserve that.” She lets her head fall back and hit the wall behind her, a solid thud that takes her mind off her emotional pain for a split second.

“Yeah, you do.” She can hear the soft smile in Neal’s voice, and it almost makes her feel guiltier. “Listen, Emma. If you found someone who makes you feel worthy of love, I’m happy for you. This is Neal, your friend, talking, okay? I’m happy for you.”

They’re quiet for a long time, Emma trying to let his words sink in, to penetrate deep to the part of her that feels dark and twisted with guilt at all times. “College really has done a number on you.”

Neal laughs. “Yeah, it’s pretty great. You’re gonna have the best time at USC.”

They talk for a few more minutes, Neal apologizing for telling Peter, Emma repeatedly clarifying that her and Killian aren’t together right now, and she is almost smiling when they hang up. She texts Killian after.

_I think Neal forgives me? Maybe you could try talking to him, too._

_Happy for you, love. Don’t see him doing the same for me quite yet. It’s okay. It was worth it._

Emma would have to agree to that.

_—-_

It’s an icy cold day in early February when Emma drives to Regina’s house. She doesn’t really mean to go there - she’s supposed to be shopping for her mom’s birthday present - but her car seems to have a mind of its own, taking her there. She rings the doorbell and waits.

Regina’s mother opens the door, which is pretty terrifying, considering she’s the mayor. Emma is always convinced she’s doing something illegal whenever she interacts with the mayor. Like she forgot she had a pound of weed in her pocket or something.

“Come in, Miss Swan. I’ll go get Regina.”

Emma follows her into the house, and then wanders into the living room to wait for Regina. She’s never fully prepared for how nice the house is, no matter how many times she visits. Being the mayor seems like a great job.

“Emma?” Regina asks as she comes into the room. “What are you doing here?”

“I just need to talk to someone who will be honest with me.” Emma takes her coat off and throws it over the back of an armchair before dropping down into the chair herself. “People are either too nice or too in love with me.”

“Well, that’s a uniquely Emma Swan problem.” Regina sits down on the couch closest to Emma. “Do you need some advice? I’d love to tell you everything you’re doing wrong.”

Emma throws the decorative pillow behind her at Regina’s head, making her duck. “I know everything I’m doing wrong. I just want to know how to make things right.”

Regina looks at her, hard, making her squirm a little bit. “I assume this is about Killian, not Neal, right?”

“Yeah. I don’t know how to go from friends to people who are sneaking around to something like a real relationship.” She looks down, playing with a stray thread on her jeans. “I’ve only had one real boyfriend and I didn’t even realize I liked him until he kissed me. How do you start dating someone you’re already in love with?”

“You’re in love with him?” Regina never misses the key words in Emma’s rambling monologues.

“I don’t know. That’s not the point.”

Regina shakes her head. “I think that’s the whole point. If you’re in love with him, just tell him. That’s all anyone wants to hear.” She leans forward. “Last year, after Daniel dumped me, I was so lost. I thought I was unlovable. Robin changed all that by just telling me how he felt. It really is that easy if you let it be.”

Emma takes a shaky breath. “But what if I’m a terrible girlfriend? He deserves better.”

Regina raises an eyebrow. “Killian Jones is a cocky asshole who has never dated anyone for longer than a week and a half and probably has girls in multiple continents crying over him. You’re confusing the way he treats _you_ with him being some perfect person. You’re too good for him, Emma. You loving him is more than he deserves.”

“You are really good at this whole advice thing,” Emma admits. “I probably should have come to you months ago.”

Regina flicks her hair over her shoulder, more to make a point than out of necessity. “You really should have. You and Jones would’ve ridden off into the sunset months ago if you just listened to me.”

They spend the rest of the afternoon eating gourmet cupcakes that Regina’s mother bought, watching bad reality dating shows, and coming up with a plan for Emma to tell Killian how she feels. Regina only mentions how much easier this all would’ve been if they had figured it out in October once. Emma considers that growth.

—-

There’s a Valentine’s Day dance and Regina manages to convince Emma that it’s the key to her whole plan. Emma thinks Regina just wants to sell more tickets, but it also sounds kind of romantic. Her and Killian don’t have a great track record with dances, but Emma is willing to try it again.

Except that the dance is less than a week away and Killian hasn’t mentioned it at all. How is Emma supposed to casually convince him to go with her if he’s acting like it’s not even happening?

She’s on the verge of a panic attack over all her plans falling apart during one of their almost-silent drives to school when she decides it’s time to take matters into her own hands.

“Did you see there’s a dance on Saturday?” She keeps her voice light, casual.

Killian looks over at her. “Aye, I saw the posters. Looks a bit cheesy, yeah?”

“It could be fun, though.” She pauses, looks over at him, meeting his bright eyes steadily for a moment. “We always make dances fun.”

He laughs softly. “Not sure we did that with the last one, Swan.”

“This could be different,” she insists.

Killian grimaces, but Emma thinks it’s supposed to be a smile. “The friend thing is going well. Let’s not screw it up before you’re ready.”

Emma wants to stop the car and scream that she is ready, she’s more than ready, she loves him, but he just looks so sad, this deep-down sadness that she knows is all her fault. They drive the rest of the way to school in silence.

Regina has no advice other than “try again” so Emma spends a sleepless night researching romantic gestures, love songs, anything that could help her. It shouldn’t be this hard to ask someone to a dance.

And that’s when it hits her, the middle of the night, endlessly scrolling through her phone. Maybe it can just be simple.

Emma gets to school so early on Friday that the parking lot is almost empty. She walks in with Miss Blanchard and Mr. Nolan, telling them about the colleges she applied to, and letting them know they’re everyone’s favorite couple. They laugh, but it’s true.

She spent the day before at the flower shop in town, trying to find a rose that was the exact color as the corsage Killian had given her. It was red, yes, but more vibrant than the classic valentine rose. It had to be perfect.

By the time Killian gets to school - after a few annoyed texts about her not telling him she was leaving early - everything is ready and Emma has convinced herself that it’s too small and stupid and he won’t care because he hates her now. A completely normal 7am spiral.

She meets him at his locker, flashing him a smile, trying to look totally normal. When he opens it, there’s a single rose taped to the inside of the door, a small note tied to the stem.

_We deserve a do-over. Come to the dance with me and I’ll tell you everything I’ve been too scared to say for months._

Killian just stares at the note for a long time before finally looking up at her. “I hope this is from you and I don’t have a stalker.”

Emma smacks his arm. “Of course it’s from me.” She tilts her head, looking at him, hard. “Please say yes. It took me way too long to come up with something this dumb.”

Killian reaches out, touching her shoulder. “It’s not dumb. Yes, I’ll go with you.”

Emma grins and threw her arms around his neck, squeezing him tight. “I’m so happy. I can’t wait.” Her lips are by his ear, and she wants to kiss him, right there in the middle of the school hallway, but she holds back. There will be plenty of time for that.

—-

Emma pulls up in front of Killian’s fifteen minutes before she said she would, too nervous to wait anymore. It’s started snowing, fluffy and white on his lawn, and she walks carefully, trying not to slip in her heeled boots. She doesn’t want to spend tonight in the ER with a concussion

Killian answers the door quickly after she knocks, dressed and ready to go. “Can I come in?” She asks.

“Yeah, of course.” He steps back, letting her in. “We can go whenever you want.”

“Actually.” Emma pauses, twists her hands together. “I was going to bring us to some romantic overlook and we could talk but it’s snowing now, so that would just be deadly. Can we talk here?”

“My dad is out, so the house is ours,” Killian says, gesturing towards the living room. Emma unbuttons her coat and tosses it on a chair, and turns to Killian. He’s looking her up and down, eyes wide, drinking in her tight red mini dress, and Emma smiles. “You look...”

“I know.” She reaches forward and takes his hands, pulling him to the couch. “I wanted to start by saying I’m sorry. For everything. For using you without realizing it. For never being brave enough to break up with Neal. For making you look so sad all the time.”

Killian squeezes her hands. “It’s okay. Neither of us were being our best.”

“I just.” She bites her lip, looks down. “I think a lot about everything we’ve been through, the whole time we’ve known each other.” She looks up at him and smiles. “Remember when we were nine and we tried to skateboard to be cool like Liam and I skinned my knee and you bandaged it up and kissed it better?” He nods. “Or when we were twelve and I had a crush on that Graham guy but he liked Regina so we skipped school to sneak into the movies and see that dumb Eddie Murphy movie? Or when I got too drunk for the first time and threw up on you but you just held my hair back and made sure I didn’t die?”

“I remember all that, love, what’s the point?”

Emma adjusts on the couch, moving closer to him. “I know I’m rambling, I’m not great with all of this. Words for feelings and stuff.” She takes a deep breath. “My whole life, I’ve felt alone. My childhood in foster care, even with how much my parents love me, there’s still this hole left in me from being abandoned. I felt it with Neal, too, like we were just two sad kids trying to be less sad together.”

Killian lifts his hand to her cheek, running his thumb across her cheekbone. “I’m so sorry you’ve felt that way.”

She reaches up and wraps her hand around his wrist. “I don’t feel that way when I’m with you.”

“What are you saying, Emma?” His face is so open, so vulnerable, and Emma wants to just kiss him now. But, no. Not yet.

“I’m saying I’m in love with you.”

Emma doesn’t know which one of them moves first, but they’re kissing, Killian’s hand moving from her cheek back of her neck, her hand tugging on his shirt, drawing him closer. It feels like coming up for air after being underwater for too long. It feels like coming home.

She’s laughing when they pull back, exhilarated, resting her forehead against his. “This was all going to be so much more romantic and not happen in your ugly living room, but I couldn’t wait. I just needed to tell you.”

“This is romantic,” Killian assures her, pressing his lips to hers again. “I love you, too.”

“I know,” she whispers, and then they’re kissing again. Emma could skip the dance, no problem.

“I won’t celebrate Valentine Day as our anniversary, though, Emma. We’re better than that.”

Emma sits back and looks at him, feeling all soft and warm and safe. “Let’s make it Halloween.” 

Killian kisses her again, a yes, and Emma thinks of that first drunken kiss all those months ago, how well they fit together, right away. If that sad girl with a crush on her best friend could see Emma now, she wouldn’t believe it. Emma likes the idea of being someone who would surprise her younger self.

—-

They’re a little late for the dance - or, forty-five minutes and three confused texts from Regina late, whichever. Emma doesn’t care.

Even when they manage to get out to her car, Killian won’t stop touching her. He opens her own car door for her, like a real gentleman, and then kisses her. He keeps his hand on her thigh while she drives, his fingers distractingly sliding a little further up under her skirt every minute.

“You look happy,” Emma says when they finally pull into the school parking lot.

“I am.” He turns in his seat to face her, lifting his hand off her thigh to take her hand. “When you and Neal split and you still didn’t want to be with me, I thought, well, that’s it. It’s all over.” He kisses her knuckles, lips warm and familiar. “I had started to give up on us.”

Emma leans forward until their heads touch. “Never give up on us.” She kisses him and then they’ve suddenly lost ten minutes to kissing and Emma has to push him away, laughing, in order to get out of the car. “Come on, Jones, I wanna show off my boyfriend.”

They interlace their fingers to walk in, and Emma can’t get over how nice this feels, to not have to hide this. To not have to quietly yearn, or whatever it was Regina said they do. “Two tickets under Emma Swan,” she says to the underclassman checking them in.

“Emma,” Miss Blanchard says with a cherry smile, walking over to them. She looks down at their clasped hands and then back up at Emma, reaching out to give her shoulder a quick squeeze. “I told you things would work out.”

Emma turns back to Killian, who has the tickets now, and is looking down at her curiously. “Miss Blanchard helped me through a nervous breakdown I had about you a few months ago, don’t worry about it.”

Killian opens his mouth to reply, but Emma is already dragging him through the doors into the gymnasium, which is decorated in all the Valentine’s Day colors, pink and red and white streamers and balloons and glitter everywhere. It’s a little overwhelming. Emma finds their friends across the room, hanging out by the photobooth, and heads there first, Killian following behind.

“Look who has arrived hand-in-hand,” Regina drawls when she sees them, but Emma can see that she’s happy. “Glad to see you’ve finally figured your shit out.”

“I was rooting for my boy Neal, but what can you do,” Will says with a shrug. Belle and Robin both reach over to hit him, Robin’s hand colliding soundly with his head. “Hey! I’m just taking the piss, we all knew this was gonna be how it ended up.”

“I’m really happy for you guys,” Belle says, reaching over to give her a one-armed hug. “I know how difficult it can be to date someone like that, so if you need any advice, come to me.”

“Or me,” Regina agrees, and Robin acts offended for a second, as if he hasn’t been suspended for stealing office supplies before, and then just grins, pulling Regina tight against him. “We can all suffer with our terrible men together.”

Ruby walks up, throwing an arm over Emma’s shoulders, laughing. “That’s why I’m sticking to girls now.”

“I don’t know. I like my terrible man just fine.” Emma looks up at Killian and smiles, and he smiles back, and for a second, it’s just the two of them.

“Ew,” Ruby teases, spinning away from Emma and grabbing Dorothy’s hands. “Let’s stop being gross and dance, guys.”

They follow her out onto the dance floor, Emma and Killian bringing up the rear, still smiling at each other. The upbeat pop song transitions smoothly into a slow song and Killian pulls Emma against him, wrapping his arms around her. It’s strange to not worry that they’re standing too close. Emma rests her head on his chest, like she’s testing it, making sure this is real and she’s not about to turn around to see Regina telling her she needs to leave room for Neal or whatever.

“This dance is going much better than the last one,” Killian says after a few moments of quiet swaying.

Emma looks up at him. “The last dance was perfect until the last like ten minutes.” She presses a kiss to his lip. “Don’t think about that bad stuff. We’re here to make new memories. Good memories.”

“A high school dance is a strange choice for a first good memory, love,” Killian teases.

“The night doesn’t end at the dance, Killian,” Emma breathes, standing on her tiptoes to whisper in his ear. He tights his grip on her waist and she just laughs a little. “This is the first of many good memories, so it can be a little silly. We can make more epic ones next.”

He kisses her again, long and deep, until Mr. Nolan has to come over and remind them to keep things PG on school property. Emma blushes and Killian shrugs, what Emma assumes is a universal guy signal for “I can’t control myself around her,” and they spin away, across the dance floor, Killian making them waltz now, like he did at prom all those months ago. Before Emma knew how he felt, before she knew how _she_ felt, when life seemed simple and good in its loneliness.

This wasn’t the senior year she planned, in all its messy, painful, heartbreaking glory, but when Emma looks at her friends, people she barely knew six months ago, when she looks at Killian, a boy who loves her so completely it scares her a little bit, it’s so much better.

* * *

**_eight months later_ **

The waves are cold against Emma’s bare feet, lapping at her ankles, making her sink slowly into the soft sand like the ocean itself is trying to take her back. She closes her eyes for a moment, setting sun warm on her face, breathing in the salt air.

Two months in California and she’s still not used to how beautiful it is.

Killian got accepted to Cal State Long Beach and USC first. Emma spent two days convinced she was going to have to go to SBC when her email finally lit up with her USC acceptance letter in the middle of her Shakespeare class. She practically ran out of the classroom when the bell rang, making it down the hall to Killian’s Economics class before the door even opened. She jumped into his arms and that was it, decision made: California.

They drove across the country together in her yellow bug, Killian making stupid jokes about how the car might not make it the whole time. They do it slowly, stopping in New York to visit Neal, Chicago to see the Bean and eat pizza, Denver to look at the mountains, Vegas to wander around casinos they’re not yet old enough to enter.

Emma has never spent that long with one person, nonstop, two weeks in bad motels and her tiny car, and she never got sick of him, not for a second. Not even when he got them lost in Nebraska or when they got in a fight in Pennsylvania. She just kept on liking him. It was new, but not bad.

College is different than she imagined, with even more parties and harder work than Neal or August prepared her for. She and Killian end up on different floors in the same building, and Emma’s roommate is never around, so there are plenty of afternoons where they don’t leave her tiny twin bed for hours. For the first time, Emma starts to feel like she might belong somewhere.

She had never cared about the beach growing up, but California beaches are different. Warmer water, wide open spaces, surfers and dogs and sometimes even a whole pier filled with vendors and a ferris wheel. She finally understands why Killian loves the ocean so much.

She feels Killian come up behind her before he says anything, takes a step back to let him wrap his arms around her. “We’re gonna be late for our own anniversary celebration if we don’t get back to the dorms and change now.”

Emma turns in his arms. “I don’t think Halloween Horror Nights with all our friends really counts as celebrating our anniversary, Jones.”

“Perhaps not, love, but I think the rather fancy hotel room I got us for after will do the trick.” She grins up at him and he kisses her, not that unlike the way he did a year ago, lips soft and hesitant until she presses against them, deepening it. Their mouths open for each other, like they always have, like they always will, and Emma lets herself free fall the way she was too scared to on that cold night, because this time, she knows Killian will catch her.

“I love you,” she whispers, always feeling so open, so vulnerable, no matter how many times she says it.

“I love you too,” Killian says, catching her.


End file.
